Living Things
by DW-chan
Summary: A team of scientists that had worked on the Scarlet Eyes draws the last living Kurata to participate in an experiment which they've developed for many years. Kurapica was repulsed with the experiment at first, until it turned into something he would never forget.
1. One: The Sentiment Experiment

***HxH Disclaimer***

**Author's Notes:** Oh lookie here I go with my "story ADHD" again. O_O Ehehe. I was just done with the fourth chapter of "The Bridge to Being" and all of a sudden my plot bunnies are hopping around the place. And I'm not even midway the fifth chapter of "Bridge." xD Oh well, hopefully this fic series will be short (because that's the plan. Sort of. :P) And yes I'll never run out of Kurapica (I somehow always spell his name that way) stories, so deal, my friends. x3

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Living Things  
By: DW-chan

**_One: The Sentiment Experiment_**

"If he's alive, he'll come to us," Dr. Zan Tournay said matter-of-factly, never taking his eyes off his silver tablet, where his fingers danced upon in quick succession.

"What makes you so sure?" one of the doctor's colleagues, Dr. Francis Barrow, inquired of his companion. "And you seem most certain that it's a male."

"Of course," Dr. Tournay said in his same, casual tone, as though he were proclaiming a timeless truth. "You've seen the list when the eyes were brought here years ago. They've been reported to be all deceased, save one. All female bodies were accounted for. The male bodies were not."

"And you really believe in those lists, don't you?" Dr. Barrow remarked, with a hint of frustration in his voice.

"I believe in the system Dr. Henaro left us with when he resigned, Francis. He's organized all the data. He's followed up on the teams that retrieved the bodies. To date we have about forty-two pairs of eyes, no more, no less. It's his five years' worth of undoubtedly hard labor we're dealing with." Dr. Tournay lifted his eyes.

The addressee only lightly shrugged, but remained silent.

"Dr. Barrow, I understand that you've felt strongly about what we've been doing here for quite some time. You can always leave the project any time you wish." There was a hint of a smile on Dr. Tournay's face. "But you haven't. What makes you stay?"

Dr. Tournay received a sigh for an answer. It was then followed by a reluctant, "You'll need damage control if your surmise is indeed true, Zan."

"Ah, and is that all?"

"Stop being an ass, Zan."

"We've been colleagues for nearly ten years now, Francis. You claim to know me. Well, I can make my own claim about my knowledge of you as well." Zan Tourney remained unfazed as he straightened up to walk across the room and lay his tablet carefully on a table, pristinely painted with the customary white of sterilized laboratories. "You're staying because you do want to see him. The last Kurata survivor. And you will see him. I have no doubts."

Francis shook his head in resignation. "Very well. I do recall, however, is that is what you told the team three years ago."

"That hasn't changed."

"Perhaps in another three years?"

"Perhaps sooner than we think."

"You claim to be a seer as you are a scientist?" Francis Barrow said, half-jokingly.

"You'll be surprised." Dr. Tournay smiled, not diabolically, but somehow, like a man who seemed surprised of his own discovery, of his own words. "Five years. I think we've waited long enough." He faced Dr. Barrow once more, who gazed at the panels of information that blinked above them, all around them—lines, lights, and dots that seem meaningless to most people, but too familiar to the two white-coated men in the room, who monitored the lights night and day, day and night.

"I've said it before and I'll say it again, Dr. Barrow: if he's alive, he'll come to us."

* * *

It had been less than two weeks when Dr. Barrow handed Dr. Tournay a flash drive.

"A messenger came in; said it was urgent," Barrow relayed to Tournay, the latter as composed as ever, sipping his coffee abstemiously as he took the device from his colleague.

"I guess you can be proud of yourself, Zan. Looks like he did find us." Barrow took a seat beside Tournay who promptly scanned what the flash drive contained in a tiny laptop which he kept with him at all times.

"Already?" Barrow lightly cringed at how pleased Tournay sounded. "Well, that's news. I guess you can also say we found what we're looking for. Ah, there we go. You see, Francis? Male, seventeen years of age. A youngster, quite astonishingly. And he has been tracking down the eyes of his fellow Kuratans for the past few months."

"He's a sharp kid to have found us out so easily," Barrow offered, keeping his eyes on the file.

"Well, that was part of the plan, actually. But I have to hand it to the kid; he found us sooner than I expected."

"And how long could we have waited based on your cold calculations, Tournay?" Barrow asked in his joking manner, only with a small hint of bitterness—if Barrow himself would have called it that.

"Another two months, at least. Yes, a smart one, this last Kuratan. The team was right. The Kuratans are no ordinary race. They're more than interesting, more than fascinating than just their eyes. Yet it is their eyes that made everything we did possible. Very extraordinary." Tournay seemed to be conversing with himself, so Barrow had to strain to hear. Finally, the older scientist—past middle age, but with the composure of a man younger than his years seemed to snap out of a reverie. "Well, we won't put up a fight. The Institute was keen enough as well to have spotted the boy as he spotted us. Fair game."

"Just to let you know, Zan, all of a sudden we seem unprepared for this," Barrow remarked. "To tell you the truth, the boy is right at our door."

"A good wait, eh, Francis? Finally you'll get to see him. Perhaps even converse with him."

"I know little of the Kuratan language." But Barrow was smiling in spite of himself. He had long objected to some ways the experiment had been conducted, but now—all his past misgivings seem to melt away.

"If the boy speaks the common language, then we're in luck." Tournay gathered his things and stepped out of the pantry back to the laboratory. Barrow followed suit, unable to contain a dark kind of excitement. None of them has ever encountered a living member of the Kuratan race, and those years of studying their culture and ways, whatever they can make of it, would be nothing compared to actually experiencing it in this boy, an embodiment of a clan thought to be extinct.

As the laboratory's glass door's slid open, the intercom by the side of the doors beeped. Tournay hurried to it. "Dr. Tournay here."

"Doctor," replied a male voice—a voice that tried hard to steady itself; perhaps its owner had been shaken not too long ago? "The visitor; he's here."

"Let him in, Caleb. No need to escort the visitor in droves. We can take it from here."

"Yes, sir."

Tournay could've shook from his own excitement—but he had nerves of steel. The boy will have questions—many questions, dozens of them. Perhaps he may even be hostile. Of course, he'd want the eyes back. This will be an interesting conversation. This will be an interesting encounter.

There was some clanging, some clicking, the sound of footsteps—and then the sound of the laboratory doors sliding open. Tournay looked up serenely, unruffled with what might follow. From the corner of his eye, he saw Barrow lick his lips, an anxious habit of his. The other man seemed to cower at first. It seemed that Barrow, just has he was, did not entirely expect someone in the form of this young man who walked up to them, though they had seen a sole image of him among the files.

He was of medium height and of light build. His eyes were dark, his face seemed carved out of granite, but there was a certain softness to it—it was a young face, perhaps fitting for a boy of fourteen rather than seventeen. He had light blond hair, and he wore what was known to be traditional Kurata garb. He spoke.

"I think you have what rightfully belongs to me."

Perfect; he spoke the common tongue fluently. Dr. Tournay, for all his efforts to keep a frigid façade, was suddenly beaming, almost doting. "Now, no need to be hasty, young man. Why don't we step into my office and discuss things for a bit? What you're here for isn't going anywhere while we talk. I can guarantee that."

The boy flinched a little. "Don't patronize me."

"Please, call me Dr. Tournay. Or Zan, if you wish." Tournay's smile did not fade. "And this is my colleague, Dr. Francis Barrow—"

"I'm not in the mood for formalities, Dr. Zan Tournay," the boy said sharply, yet he kept his distance away from the scientists. They were actually in a basement laboratory, and the way down was a little more than a maze. Should the boy create a ruse, there was no escape. Even then, they could not risk harming the last survivor. The experiment has to go through as planned. Everything has to be contained. They must not incite any aggression from their visitor.

"Manners, young man!" admonished Dr. Tournay, not unkindly, still with a smile. "Now if you'd step into my office. Caleb, Jonas, you may leave him here."

"But sir—" the one named Caleb spoke.

"We'll be fine. If you're still a-flutter, you can stay by the door."

"I, uh—" Barrow was at loss for words. He was rather dazed, now that he had first seen what he remained in the project for. The boy was human, yet he was a precious link to their many long years of study. Many other scientists, sociologists, members of the academe—they would clamor for an opportunity like this. They've encountered so many freaks and wonders of nature but this, this one seemed, as Tournay said, _extraordinary_. The boy glanced at him for a moment, and Barrow felt like an idiot. The boy must've thought that he, a learned man, was naught but a simpleton in a white coat. Barrow swallowed hard and followed the boy and Tournay into the office—all glass, all white-washed walls, all lights, dots, and lines.

"You'll have to pardon me; I haven't had the chance to ask for your name," Dr. Tournay continued as he took a seat at the head of a small oval table. Barrow surreptitiously took a seat beside Tournay. The boy remained standing.

"Oh, you know my name. But I'm not inclined to repeat it," the boy replied coldly.

_Kuratan pride and stubbornness_, noted Barrow silently. He felt compelled to confirm every single theory from their studies in every word, every gesture, every expression imparted by the boy. He swallowed hard again, and felt a small fragment of shame creep to him. He was a scientist, but he was not about to see this boy as a subject one could freely place in a test tube or a petri dish as well as what they had done to his deceased comrades.

"Smart boy," Dr. Tourney perceived aloud. His smile faded a bit, but whatever left his lips had danced into his eyes. The doctor was apparently pleased with the encounter so far. "Yes, we have been gathering information about you some time before you decided to show up at our door. In fact, it's something we could have done earlier if not for the many matters we had to attend to—Kurapica."

The boy kept a near-expressionless façade, while his eyes narrowed for a fraction of second.

"What could you possibly say to me now, doctor? I'm here, but I don't have all day. You will return the eyes to me, and I'll be on my way."

Barrow felt like a mere observer thus far. A momentary silence filled the office, and then Tournay finally spoke. "I'm afraid it won't be that easy to return them to you, my boy—"

"Please don't call me that," Kurapica said, perhaps in mock politeness. "And I don't see how difficult it would be for me to take all the eyes and leave."

"Yes, that's something that I would have heard from a living Kuratan," Tournay remarked, a little too delightedly, not in the least daunted by the boy's bold words. Barrow didn't have a doubt that the boy can carry out what he said, Kurata or not. There was an air about Kurapica that was like a wild beast ready to strike. _Nen-user, Professional Hunter_, the information said, among other facts. What can five short years do to one so young, after he had lost everything and everyone, save his own life? _Many things_, Barrow heard himself answer.

A ghost of a smile appeared on the young boy's lips, but there was such dissonance between that smile and the hardness in his eyes, which were seemingly inky and depthless. "It must be thrilling for you, doctor, to see the last living Kuratan right before you, is it not?"

Tournay didn't hesitate with his reply. "To be sure, young man. In fact," the smile returned to Tournay's lips. "I'm very pleased that you have paid us a visit. In all honesty, this was more than we expected."

Kurapica did not reply after a while, until finally, a hint of confusion marked his face. "I'm not entirely sure I understand what you're saying. And I'm not entirely sure I like how things are turning out."

"Yes, to be sure with that as well," Tourney answered the boy with his customary composure. "It's understandable. If you do take the eyes, you'll be taking with you forty-two pairs, the most you'll have in one go. Am I right?"

The boy remained silent, grim as ever.

"Ah, no matter; you are quite the reticent type, but no matter." Tournay's smile transformed into a grin. "It's time to stop beating around the bush and get right to the heart of the matter. Dr. Barrow—"

Barrow started at the sound of his name. "Yes?"

"Kindly take Kurapica to the main reservatory."

Barrow was even more startled by that request. "This may be too soon," he retorted; the Kurata youth glanced at him with confusion now all too evident on his features.

"Now is as good as any time," said Tournay. "Go on; I'll be right behind you."

"This better not be a trick," Kurapica muttered, and it took a moment for Barrow to realize that he was the one addressed to.

Barrow collected himself. Would he adopt the same strange friendliness Dr. Tournay kept on the boy? There was no time to decide. "Our work is too precious to be tricks, Kurapica." He was surprised with the gentleness in his voice. It dawned to him that he was bracing the boy for what may be more or less a shock to him. He wagered on the former.

The boy now looked visibly troubled. "And what work is that?"

Barrow felt that he had betrayed his own self. What he was about to show the boy was _the_ portion of the project he had objected to. It drew a fine line, too much of a fine line, but yes, so much hard work, long research, and heavy financial aid had been poured on the project. Everything now would narrow down to how Kurapica would take all this in.

"This is just the viewing room; the reservatory is just right outside these walls. We maintain certain temperatures in the reservatory and it might not be too wise to step into it just yet. A moment—"

Why was he so calm and collected? He was not far from jittery only a few minutes ago, when Kurapica darkly proclaimed his resolve. But this was finally it. He surprisingly acknowledged the fact that he, after all, had faith on the project. He glanced back at the boy, whose troubled gaze looked about the depths of the glass, as though some foul creature would jump out of it.

Barrow's compassionate side asserted itself. "Kurapica, I won't lie. What you will see might overwhelm you."

The boy turned to him. "Enough talk," he said stonily. "Show what you have to show me." A trace of anxiety, somehow, can be detected in the young man's voice.

"Very well."

He walked to the end of the viewing room and flipped a switch.

Almost instantly, lights began to flood the reservatory. The lights had a soft, icy glare, and one by one the vastness of the reservatory was lit. The viewing room was some height above the reservatory, which was the size of a large warehouse; but whatever the reservatory kept could, of course, be well seen from the viewing room.

Barrow resigned himself to the fact that he was still a scientist; he still needed to do his job, so he kept his eyes on the boy and observed every reaction he could grasp. By this time the reservatory was fully and well lit; doubtless, the boy could see it now.

Could see _them_ now.

No words escaped the boy, but there it was—his eyes were wide, and the boy, apparently, had been wearing contacts to conceal his true nature. However, the hue could not be missed. Under the artificial dark irises were an unmistakable reflections of bright red.

"You—_what_—" the boy began, but he was grappling hard for words.

"This is five years' worth of hard work, Kurapica," came a voice that entered the viewing room; Tournay had caught up with them. "And even more years of research apart from that."

"Science is very useful," Barrow began; he felt like he had memorized a spiel and was now delivering it on autopilot. "But it can be unforgiving, to say the least."

There, on the well-lit reservatory, were forty-two human-sized incubator tanks, and in each one was a motionless human figure, seemingly deep in slumber. They were all garbed in light grey that covered them from neck to shin, so their faces can be seen.

In the tanks were forty-two fully-formed human clones, unquestionably, in another lifetime, once the owners of the forty-two pairs of eyes.

* * *

**A/N:** Now I'm not sure if this plot device has been used in the HxH-verse before, but I'm pretty sure I may not be the first one who thought of it. :P In any case, leave a comment or a review; you know you want to! :P

Cheers!

DW-chan


	2. Two: The Project

*HxH Disclaimer*

**Author's Notes:** I'm no authority when it comes to the science of cloning. :P Whatever I sputter out here about the subject is from pure imagination and speculation. Anyways, I plan to go through this fic quickly before the plot bunnies escape through the writer's block hatch. xD Without further ado: chapter two! (And that rhymed. Ohoho)

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Living Things  
By: DW-chan

**_Two: The Project_**

"Dr. Henaro was a Hunter, but he was also a scientist. In his younger days, it was always his interest to study the Kurata culture, way of living, and history; well, you can almost say that it was an obsession of his, and an unrequited passion at that," Tournay began, seemingly oblivious to the Kurata boy's face which had been drained of all color. He was still stunned. Barrow frowned. Tournay would babble on and for what? The boy seemed too flustered to pay attention. This revelation had been done too prematurely.

Tournay continued, "He never was granted permission to step on the Rukuso region, despite pleading his case to the Kurata elders."

_And for good reason_, Barrow mused, but he kept such thoughts to himself unless the situation called for it. He usually had some "scholarly banter" with Tournay once in a while, but sympathy had drowned out the man of science in him as he witnessed the boy's reaction.

"Everything we know of the Kurata was the little we could glean from the elders, and from hundred years' worth of Kurata history, most of which are only speculation. I must admit, the Kurata have really successfully cut off their existence from the known civilized world. I say 'civilized' in a manner similar to this—" Tournay waved a hand across the facility. "Though from what Dr. Henaro was able to efficaciously conclude was that the Kurata have a culture far from primitive, though they live simply." For the first time since Tournay started speaking from the moment the clones were revealed, he addressed the boy by name. "But only you can confirm this, Kurapica."

The boy's voice was strained, but an audible tremor could be discerned as he spoke. "What makes you think that you have the _right_ to do this?"

"The Project was not without its controversies, Kurapica," Barrow found the opportunity to interject his own position in the matter. "In fact, at first, this was heavily opposed. I, for one, opposed it—"

Kurapica looked into his eyes as he spat his embittered words. "You won't get any sympathy from me."

"—But we had the resources," weaved in Tournay before Barrow could continue. "When Dr. Henaro leanred of the massacre, he was grieved, that's for sure and certain. Honestly stricken."

"I bet he was," Kurapica uttered, the bitterness not leaving him. His fists were clenched. Visibly he was mustering all the restraint he could. How much of a murderous streak did the boy have in him? Barrow wondered. The scientist said earlier that he also stayed in the Project to carry about some damage control. Frankly to himself, however, he had considered himself to be part of the damage in the process. According to one of the speculations, most Kuratans are deadly when provoked to their limits. The team could experiment all they want, but once they tested that theory, there was no turning back. They would all be cold in their graves.

As always, Tournay remained settled in his own skin and in his own train of thought. "He visited Rukuso himself to help retrieve and identify the bodies. It was he and another member of the team—a certain Dr. Farenski, not a Hunter but nearly just as skilled—who discovered the possibility of a survivor." He nodded to Kurapica. "You."

The young man had somehow been listening to the story despite the rage that swung like a precarious pendulum within him. He calmed down somewhat, but his fists remained clenched. Something like a faint rattle of chains filled the room for a moment before it disappeared entirely.

"If Dr. Henaro was so much an integral part if this… project—" The boy placed so much emphatic scorn on the word _project, _"—where is he now?"

"I like good, old-fashioned curiosity in young ones, don't you think, Dr. Barrow?" Tournay once more smiled his unsettlingly delighted smile as he addressed his colleague. But he did not wait for Barrow to answer when he said, "He's finally resigned due to a recurring illness, and we haven't heard from him since, and that was two years ago. God knows, the good soul may have already passed on, bless him. But he's turned over everything to me, Dr. Barrow, and about sixteen more of us."

"And where are they?"

"Goodness me, young man!" Tournay lightly chuckled. "Do you plan to round us all up and snuff our lights out in one blow?" There was sick humor in the notion, but Tournay delivered it without the least bit effort.

"I'm not far from doing that," Kurapica admitted in the still-embittered voice. "I could kill you, right here, right now, simply for the having the gall to experiment on my people."

"My, my, such a spirited lad you are, Kurapica. Well, I'm not stopping you if that's what you want, though of course, I believe Dr. Barrow would like to be spared?" Tournay mentioned good-naturedly.

Barrow sighed and placed a hand to his temple. "Dr. Tournay, you can keep your suggestions to yourself, if you please."

"All this talk of killing!" Tournay resumed, not the least frazzled. "I would like to believe you a peaceful sort of people, but alas, a lot have surmised otherwise. Please, Kurapica, do calm down. I'm very much certain that there is a part of you that would like to get to the bottom of things. In fact, a _large_ part of you."

Tournay's proclamation seemed to take the boy off-guard. The iciness in the young man's glare softened a little as he averted his gaze so he no longer started straight into Tournay's eyes. The boy swore under his breath.

Barrow found his voice again. "Thirty-seven pairs of eyes found their way to the Black Market. Forty-two found their way to us, thanks to Dr. Henaro. We meant to study the eyes on their own. The Scarlet Eyes-_your_ Scarlet Eyes had a cell component which was very unique from any other human, or any other living being on the planet. We studied it—"

"And replicated it. Billions of jennies' worth of grants have been spent on the Project. Most of it had been shouldered by Dr. Henaro and the Institute."

"You don't know your limits," Kurapica sputtered darkly. "You call yourselves people of science, but I can only think of people who exploit human lives." The boy seemed beleaguered and did not know where to direct his gaze. Barrow could tell that the sight of the clones weighed heavily on the boy. Tournay, on the other hand, had eyes that were too probing.

"We've heard it all, Kurapica. Ethics, morals, what-have-yous. Limitations. And this was as far as we can go," Tournay said. "Cloning is an ever-growing controversy. It's said that a Nen Conjurer can form aural copies of a non-living object. But science—it is only science that can create living ones. You see, the Institute has funded more than dozens of cloning experiments over the years. But each and every one had failed. I would not go much into detail about the past failures, but I can tell you straight out is that we have successfully cloned not only one, but forty-two human beings because of one component no other subject which was experimented on had."

"Our Scarlet Eyes," Kurapica concluded. Only one of his fists now remained clenched.

_His guard is lowering_, Barrow observed. Should he be relieved? The boy can still, after all, carry on his near whole-hearted promise of killing them both, and the Project team—there's no saying what the Kurata would do. Saying that the Project had been a great risk from the very beginning was an understatement.

"Smart lad!" Tournay praised, solely pleased with how Kurapica seemed to absorb everything after recovering from the initial shock. "We are trying our best to preserve the million mysteries waiting to be unearthed from the Scarlet Eyes. And what better way than to replicate the eyes—clone their owners, and return the eyes to them? You can almost say that your people have their eyes back. Only—"

"Stop it…" Kurapica's voice was beginning to break.

"Tournay, can't you see the boy's no longer in a rage? He's aggravated—" began Barrow, who always had a streak for commiseration.

"—Only not in their original bodies," Tournay punctuated his litany. "Kurapica, we haven't had the chance to wake any of the clones since they've been fully developed a year ago. We've approximated their ages to match the time their original bodies passed on. That's rare in the process of cloning."

The boy finally seemed to end his stupor. He once more met the gaze of Zan Tournay. The young man had finally understood, and Tournay picked it up like a juicy morsel to feast on.

"Now that I'm here," Kurapica said slowly, almost calculatedly, "you plan to wake them."

"Precisely." Tournay grinned. "But not all at once, of course. Perhaps there is someone you know among the forty-two? Come, let's step into the reservatory, shall we? If we can adjust the temperatures a bit, we can go in with no trouble." Tournay approached a seemingly nondescript panel in front of the room, and he slid it open with a flick of his hand to reveal a touch-screen monitor. He punched in a few keys that appeared on the screen, and green lights began to flicker throughout the room.

"Green's a go. Now if you'll follow me…" Tournay stepped out of the viewing room. On the way out he seemed quite gregarious in greeting a newcomer. "Dr. Ryger, welcome! Ah, you've heard the news, haven't you? Yes, he's here. Quite irascible but he seems ready to cooperate. Yes, yes, a moment. Kurapica—"

The boy seemed more compliant this time. Perhaps it was the tension from the impending possibility of witnessing a phase of the experiment which has solely been preserved for when he was present.

Dr. Ryger was a small, bearded man, seemingly harmless. Dr. Ryger smiled. "It's quite an honor to meet you—" but knowing that Kurapica may not return to shake his hand, the doctor kept his own hands to his sides. "Well, I suppose Dr. Tournay has explained everything—well, _most_ of everything to you?"

"Yes," Kurapica answered simply, succinctly, lacking emotion. Part of his guard resumed its place once more upon seeing the new face, but not as obdurate as it had been when he first met the two scientists.

"I'm more of a medical doctor, you see," Dr. Ryger went on. "I've been closely monitoring their vitals for the past year. Heart rate, brain waves, blood pressure—and they've remained normal. They're normal now. They're simply asleep. Injecting a small drug—don't fret, it won't harm them—into their system will wake them up from this year-long coma."

"Not all at once, as I've mentioned earlier. That would be quite a riot!" Tournay was once more delighting in his words, and in the situation altogether. "We will initially pick two to revive. And then three, then maybe four. Gradually until all forty-two are awake. Well, that will take time, won't it?"

"And too much to take in at once," added Barrow. Kurapica looked at him, as if woken from a dream, as if finally realizing he can find an ally in Dr. Francis Barrow in the midst of this madness. Barrow acknowledged Kurapica's less-than-hostile glance with a smile and a nod.

"Yes, true. To be surrounded by familiar faces, and yet under different circumstances," concurred Ryger in his soft-spoken voice.

"This doesn't mean I agree with what you've been doing," Kurapica clarified, trying to be spiteful, but rather failing.

"Human lives, yes," Barrow agreed. "Delicate human lives, as I've always told my colleagues."

"Yes, well, enough dilly-dallying, we have an experiment to commence! Kurapica, my boy, don't just stand there!" A certain fog seemed to have settled in Kurapica's mind that even being called "my boy" by a resented figure came unnoticed. "There are twelve adult men, eighteen adult women, five juvenile girls and seven juvenile boys. Surely there could be someone you closely know from them?" Tournay led them to a small lift that took them two stories down into the reservatory.

"Zan, we can show Kurapica screenshots of their faces instead," Barrow suggested. Has he grown a soft spot for the boy? If any, he felt sorry for the young one. Somehow he knew there was still a part of Kurapica that wanted _not_ to participate, and to just go on with his original plans. It was clearer now: one of the team members once dubbed this phase of the Project, t_he Sentiment Experiment._ The boy had nothing and everything to do with these clones, which mere shadows of his once-living people, and yet there was no turning back once he assented. Barrow continued, "That way, he doesn't have to go through each and every incubator tank manually."

"That seems like a better idea, Francis," Tournay acceded with a smile. He nodded to the soft-spoken Dr. Ryger.

The glass lift's doors slid open and all four stepped out and into the reservatory.

Barrow once more felt inclined to observe Kurapica. The youth seemed to be in a trance, and the dissonance was there again as he tried to mask his emotions in vain. Forty-two casket-like containers where the clones lay in were now in closer view. The incubators were transparent on all sides save for the portion where the feet lay.

"Here we go," Ryger said as he handed Barrow and Kurapica a much larger tablet. "Just flip through. If there's someone you know, let us know. It won't be too difficult to revive them."

"If we could find his parents, that would be most ideal!" Tourney intoned in his unbidden, excited manner. "A parent, a sibling, a cousin, an aunt or uncle, a close friend—"

Kurapica stared at the sleeping faces—screen captures of every clone in the room—on the tablet like an automaton. His hand slid through the screen, flipping from one photo to another, and Barrow could see that the boy's hand trembled. He was holding the tablet for Kurapica, whose grip seemed unreliable at that moment. _Too much to take in_.

"This man," Kurapica finally announced, and tapped at a photo so that it swiveled to a corner of the screen. "And this woman." He tapped the screen once more. The boy inadvertently pushed the tablet away from his person once he was done. Barrow nodded, kindly. If the boy allowed himself to be touched, he would have placed a hand on his shoulder. As it is, the boy was not too keen on any physical contact.

"Excellent," proclaimed Tourney. He took the tablet as Ryger passed it on to him. "Who would they be, Kurapica?"

"It looks like you did find their eyes," Kurapica replied, and he no longer hid the emotion that threatened to burst forth since the moment he saw the clones from the viewing room. "My parents."

* * *

**A/N: **I'm having a bit of trouble switching from one point of view to another. Oh well, let me see if I can rectify that in the next chapter. ^^ Sending this off with a chuckle.

Cheers!

DW-chan :3


	3. Three: Reviving

***HxH Disclaimer***

**Author's Notes:** I'm still not exactly sure how far this fic will go, but hopefully it'll be less than 10 chapters. ^^ I can always direct my own stories but as you now, some stories can have lives of their own. :P I won't go too technical and hard core on the "Sci Fi" part of the fic to save you some headache. xD I'll just dribble in something here and there once in a while. ^^;

Thanks, Bai-Feng and NJ7009 for reviewing my story so far! :) I appreciate it, guys. :D

* * *

Living Things  
By: DW-chan

**_Three: Reviving_**

"Capsule eight and twenty-seven," relayed Tournay to Ryger, who nodded and produced a tiny silver box from one of his laboratory coat pockets. The box was only a fraction smaller than the palm of a hand, and it seemed to be password-sealed. Ryger entered a code as deftly as he could onto a tiny screen on the box and punched in his thumbprint. It seemed that only Ryger had strict access to whatever was in the box.

Three tiny beeps were heard before the box made a snapping sound and opened; a compartment slid out. Inside was an array of even tinier syringes.

Even Barrow had not seen how the "reviving serum" looked like until now. The syringes were filled with a clear liquid which can be easily be mistaken for water, if not for the manner it faintly glowed. He glanced at the Kurata boy—the latter appeared to be taking everything in stride. However, his brows were tightly knit, but the red glares from under the dark contacts were gone.

Ryger was taking out a syringe from the box and he smiled rather nervously at the lot before him, and nodded to Tournay. "Seems like everything's in order, eh?" Tournay grinned. He then took hold of the tablet once more, tapped in a few codes; the atmosphere seemed to change further as the green lights that blinked silently around the room were joined by foggy blue pinpricks; the combination of lights made it look like they were in some kind of cold, underwater rave party. The only difference was that everything was silent—until a hiss was heard somewhere towards the left side of the reservatory, and then another hiss further back.

Two of the incubation tanks rose a few feet to the air; mist formed from under the tanks as they moved up to an angle which had the clones inside be somewhere between lying down and standing. The two incubator capsules finally stood out from the rest: all the caskets were identical, whether an adult or a child lay within them.

"Mom or Dad first, Kurapica?" Tournay asked of the young man, but the boy was too absorbed in his own thoughts, if the boy's brain had not numbed itself to mask everything around him to oblivion. When the boy did not reply, Tournay shrugged and looked down at the tablet. "Well, Capsule eight is apparently closer and it seems to have Mom in it." He looked up, his eyes bright with an eager light.

"Dr. Ryger?"

"Oh, you'd have to come with me," said Ryger.

"There's nothing to be afraid about, doctor! I can always call the rest of the team if we run in to some trouble."

"Oh, it's not really that, Zan," Ryger replied. "You know we'd rather that the mother see a familiar face instead of ours. I was referring to Kurapica." The doctor looked up at the young man and smiled.

"I'll go with the you," Barrow volunteered, his voice firm. _Damage control_, he repeated to himself at the back of his mind. "If you'd allow me, doctor?"

Ryger looked more than a tad nervous as he absently nodded. "No crowding, no speaking unless I give the signal." It was as if he were merely repeating a formulated protocol.

The group made their way to the Capsule eight; surely enough, an adult woman with the same blonde hair as Kurapica's was in it, her eyes closed, her face covered in some kind of frost. But the face was serene and young; it was as though it had never known suffering or pain, or intense emotions.

Kurapica stopped short some feet away from the capsule—did the boy finally change his mind?

Barrow stepped beside the boy. "Kurapica, you don't have to go through this." It was only a half-lie.

"Do I?" returned the young man, but he did not turn to Barrow. "I've now stepped into your precious experiment." There was a spark of emotion in his voice.

Ryger's thumbprint found its way to a control panel somewhere by the foot of the capsule, and when he nodded to Tournay, the scientist tapped in another code. The thick glass of the capsule began to slide away.

From the corner of his eye, Barrow could see Kurapica looking away. _He's seeing a stranger with his mother's face_, Barrow thought. He can only surmise why the boy had not turned away from the Project, especially when he was given the invitation to be part of it. It may or may not be the same reasons why Barrow himself had not left the Project even when there were countless opportunities he could have.

Ryger took out a syringe and approached the sleeping Kurata clone. He was to inject it into a vein on her neck and was about to stick the needle in.

"Wait," Kurapica abruptly called out. All heads turned to the youth.

Barrow braced himself for what he might here. Will the boy condemn the experiment in earnest? Will he walk away? Will he go berserk then leave? The dissonance had not left the boy's face.

"Yes, Kurapica?" Tournay said.

"Nothing," Kurapica immediately uttered, and Barrow, who had studied what was called "mircro-expressions" and had been using the technique ever since he began observing the boy, could see that even Kurapica himself did not know why he said that. "It's nothing."

"Nervous, my boy? That's completely normal." Tournay's voice was upbeat. With a silent signal to Ryger, the doctor finally injected the serum into the clone's body.

"It might take a while for her to wake up," Ryger admitted. "Give it two minutes at least. We—"

Ryger had barely finished his next sentence when the clone's eyelids began to move. A finger, then two, then three, began to twitch. She breathed deeper, more comfortably, and before Ryger could proclaim that her vitals were still normal upon waking, the eyes opened.

Ryger hastily motioned for Kurapica to step in front of the capsule. He made motions that he will adjust the capsule in a way so that the woman and the boy could at least see eye to eye. Wordlessly, Kurapica followed, but his steps dragged for a moment before it transformed into steady strides.

Barrow could make out a "we have to make sure that you are the first person she sees," when Ryger whispered to the boy.

The clone woman's eyes were now wide open. Her gaze was unfocused at first, and she began to blink again. And then she was looking at Kurapica.

But the boy was slowly losing his composure. Red blazed behind the contacts once more. It seemed that he could not tear his own gaze from the woman that looked exactly like his dead mother, a woman who was now awake, and only simply orienting herself with the environment around her. Barrow somehow doubted that Kurapica's image had registered into her consciousness.

Kurapica seemed like a flustered child, finding a place to run to, but finding only a dead end. He suddenly turned to Barrow, his face verily confused. His mouth slightly opened to speak, but no words came out. The boy's breathing was rapid, labored.

That was when Barrow ran to Kurapica's aid when the boy tottered as he attempted to turn away. He seemed to have lost his footing and Barrow steadied the boy, placing an arm behind his back; he was doing all this with a grave expression on his face and not uttering a sound, lest the clone got startled. But the woman, while her eyes were opened, retained a blank expression on her face. Ryger turned to Tournay, and the latter's eyebrows only raised. Ryger seemed shaken; Tournay was not.

Barrow grit his teeth in frustration. He wanted Ryger to give a signal for him to speak but he only heard his voice say, "The boy is too vulnerable now, Zan! Ryger, we need to take him to a room. Stop, stop this experiment!"

"Francis, what on earth are you—" Tournay's slightly puzzled voice.

"Francis, we've already awoken a clone—" Ryger's disconcerted, soft-spoken one.

"To hell with all that! You think this came with a manual? Kurapica will see the clone when he is ready. I'm taking him out of the reservatory."

"Very well, Francis. Josef," Tournay addressed Ryger, "make sure the boy recuperates. I'll have Dr. Rinder and Dr. Monroe assist me with the clone."

On the way to a recovery room, Barrow looked at Kurapica. His hair had fallen onto his face, so whatever expression the boy had was hid. He still breathed heavily. The boy's hands were cold.

_Stop the experiment_, he had said back in the reservatory. And if they did, if they had indeed stopped the experiment then and there by some miracle, Barrow realized that he would not be entirely sure where he can go from there.

* * *

"Would you still like to continue?" Barrow talked to the boy, gently, transactionally, yet he could not hide his concern. Tournay was too callous and Ryger spent most of his life among figures of the Institute that they could not possibly completely grasp the fragility of the situation. Barrow knew it was up to him to speak to Kurapica in a way he knew would not thrust the boy into a raging fire. "You haven't signed anything, you haven't set anything on stone. You're free to leave—"

"—Not without my people's eyes," was Kurapica's soft reply. The boy's eyes were cast downwards. It only took a moment for the boy to come to his senses again, but he remained uncommunicative until this instant. "But I know that's impossible now."

"Yes, the eyes have been fused into the clones. The eyes that they own are the same eyes we've retrieved from what Tournay keeps on saying, 'original bodies.' I don't always agree with Tournay, or the rest of the team, but I would not have stayed if I knew this Project would come to absolutely nothing. Kurapica," Barrow's voice remained subdued. "Tournay sees you as a commodity. You've seen that. But you are a _person_."

"Everyday I feel less of that," was Kurapica's surprising reply. Barrow blinked. He had come to an impression that the boy would only reveal his deepest emotions and thoughts to close, trusted people. The fact that the boy may be confiding in him now was more than Barrow could expect. He shook his head. Tournay had been half-mocking him when he told Barrow that perhaps he could _even_ converse with the Kurata boy, if he was lucky. But this seemed more than he bargained for.

Barrow was no therapist. He was no psychologist, save perhaps that he had learned to read the tiniest expressions from people on his own. Still, that wasn't his specialization. Advanced biotechnology, microbiology, yes—but to confide with a seventeen-year-old boy? He, however, had placed the role upon himself since the beginning, Barrow acceded. At this small moment in time, the boy's well-being was in his hands.

"Is… is that way you subjected yourself to this experiment, Kurapica?" Barrow responded. They were in the recuperating room, but Kurapica had refused to lie on the bed and rest. He sat by the cushioned bench at the far end of the room, and with permission, Barrow joined him at the opposite end.

"There was nothing to lose," the boy replied in his quiet tone. Then a longer silence reigned.

When Barrow was certain that the boy would not speak any further, he said, "And perhaps, everything to gain?" He lightly smiled, but it was not the gloating smile Tournay always wore.

Kurapica looked up. The boy had taken off his contact lenses so his eyes showed their true color, the color when he was calm, collected, and had his emotions in check. Only, now, there was a hint of sadness and confusion. "I'm the trigger, aren't I? That's why you had waited for me to come by before you woke any of the clones up?"

"That's an educated guess, but yes, you can say that," Barrow agreed. "We wanted to test a theory, since your Scarlet Eyes had revealed so much potential in them already."

"May I know what the theory exactly is?"

Barrow thought for a moment. The boy had every right to know what he had subjected himself into. "Clones do not have memories. They are a clean slate, from the moment they are born, or when they wake up. They don't share the same memories with the original subject from whom they were cloned. But once we had fused the Scarlet Eyes back into the clones' bodies, we noticed a pattern in their brain waves which is once again unique from any other living beings'. We came to a conclusion that when the clones wake up and are exposed to the right stimuli, they would be able to recall memories which the original subjects had."

"You are playing God," muttered Kurapica, but without anger.

"We are playing God," Barrow acknowledged. He ran a hand down his face; he usually did that when he felt the strings of stress pull at him. "There's no excuse. There was a whole new body of science alone which can be extracted from your Scarlet Eyes. I have known for a fact that they are called one of the seven beauties of the world. But the Institute, Dr. Henaro, and the team, well—we wanted to explore so many possibilities. In five short years, this has all been made, but the work is far from done."

Kurapica nodded, but he had directed his gaze to the floor again. His hands were folded in front of him. They no longer trembled. "Where have you taken her?" He meant the clone.

"She's in another recuperating room in the meantime. We've decided not to revive your father's clone yet. It took a while to convince Tournay, but he agreed that you will not be seeing your mother's clone until you are ready."

Kurapica shifted a little. "She has seen me…"

"Yes, she's seen you. She may not have recognized you, but she has seen you."

The boy nodded, the bobbing of his head barely visible. He slowly looked up again. "I would like to see her again, Dr. Barrow."

Barrow knew than to question the youth's resolve. He had seen the boy in a defenseless state not so long ago. Whatever he was seeing now was far from that, and he himself knew just as much as Kurapica did that it was a risk he needed to take.

"Like I said, Dr. Barrow," continued Kurapica, "There's nothing to lose."

* * *

Kurapica watched the lone woman clothed in a grey body suit as she looked up and down the whitewashed walls from behind a one-sided mirror. His face was unreadable. Perhaps, Barrow thought, to compensate for the unbridled rush of emotion he had shown back at the reservatory.

The woman, the clone, still looked rather disoriented; she did not even notice her reflection when she turned to their direction. It was the same expressionless stare.

"Has she spoken yet?" Barrow inquired of Dr. Rinder, one other scientist of the team which Tournay had to send for earlier. Rinder was about Barrow's age, but he commanded less bearing and seemed like a type who kept to indoor research rather than dabble in fieldwork and mingle with colleagues.

"Not since she woke up, Francis." Rinder seemed nervous around the Kuratan boy as he kept flicking his gaze between Barrow and Kurapica, even as he spoke with Barrow. Rinder and the boy had been introduced earlier; the boy simply nodded, and Rinder heaved a rattled smile.

"Where is Tournay?"

"With Monroe and Ryger. I think they still plan to revive the male clone."

"For all the—" Barrow lifted a hand to his temple.

Kurapica had heard. He momentarily looked at their direction before resuming his gaze on his mother's clone.

"Seems like you're desensitizing the boy," whispered Rinder, quite recklessly, at Francis Barrow.

"I think you are," Kurapica replied steadily, without turning neither to Rinder nor Barrow. "I can hear you."

"Sorry, sir," Rinder abased himself. Barrow smiled. Kurapica may have also sensed that Rinder was intimidated by his presence. Rinder usually did not address anyone "sir" unless it was his own father.

"Just making sure if you're really ready," Barrow elucidated. "And if _she_ is."

Kurapica had folded his arms. He was silent for a while.

"Will you take me to her?" requested the youth. Like a child asking permission to go out on a rainy day, he looked at Barrow. It was unintentional, but his emotions had been raw for the past few hours.

"Tournay would certainly want to witness this," Rinder interjected with a stammer.

"Then call him," Barrow said impatiently, a little irritably. _Hopefully I won't be hearing any more about reviving the clone of Kurapica's father until we have this situation under control._

"Dr. Barrow," Kurapica once more spoke. "If you'd allow me, I'd like to go alone. You will be able to see me from here, right?"

Barrow was relieved; he seemed to have gained the young man's respect. It was not easy, and he knew he would have to keep earning it.

"Yes, yes, I will be able to see you," Barrow echoed with a small smile. "Tournay will arrive when he can. If you wish to go ahead, go on."

The boy left the room to step into the other one, where the female clone seemed startled at first when the door of her room opened. Sure enough, Kurapica stood at the doorway, seemingly collected now, and more so.

Barrow cocked his head to take a glimpse of a screen which hung to his upper left. Apart from the one-sided mirror, cameras had been set up around the clone's recuperating room. He could see the woman's face on one of the screens. She wore the same blank expression for nearly more than an hour.

But—

There it was: the woman's brows furrowed a bit. Her eyes scanned the boy warily from head to toe, toe to head. It seemed that Kurapica had not moved, and he showed no signs of distress or of being inundated.

_This experiment seems __**his**__ now as it is ours_, Barrow caught himself thinking. The boy was acting on his own, without instruction, and yet what he was doing was something the team would have wanted. It was even something _Tournay_ would have wanted.

"Signs of recognition?" Rinder wondered aloud. "Did you see that…?"

"Yes," Barrow replied. But unlike Rinder, he could note the tiniest flinch, the smallest, flitting twitch on a person's face.

The woman's brows no longer furrowed. It was Barrow's turn for his own brows to knit themselves capriciously. Barrow's eyes darted from mirror to screen time and again. He saw it now.

A clone with no memories whatsoever, with a mind as clean as a slate, had finally recognized something—someone.

Her son.

* * *

**A/N: **My apologies if this chapter's a bit dragging. ^^;;; And if the POV's are still a bit messed up as well. In the next chapter, I plan to stick to one character's point of view. :) The game changes here a bit, since, well, see, the story wrote itself—since Kurapica claimed the experiment as his own too. ^^;;;

See ya'll in the next chapter, yarrrr. Don't forget to review, react, drop a note, etc etc. :P

Cheers!

DW-chan :3


	4. Four: A Fine Line

***HxH Disclaimer***

**Author's Notes:** Courtesy of Bai-Feng, I realized that I may be writing about a sensitive topic/s. :P Not cloning per se, but a whole lot of other things revolving around our beloved Kurata. ^^;; Apart from a (sort of) pre-planned plot, I also plan to address those topics somehow. 'Twill be a pleasure. :3

P.S. I also realized that this fic has gotten quite dark and then some (still is), so maybe I'll put in some humor in future chapters.

P.P.S. Let's try using more of Kurapica's point of view (third person) for this chapter. See how it turns out. ^^

* * *

Living Things  
By: DW-chan

**_Four: A Fine Line_**

_You haven't signed anything_, the scientist named Barrow told him. _You haven't set anything on stone. You're free to leave_.

Kurapica was certain that while he had not written anything down, he had signed his name on a figurative book of demons, when he assented to take part of this project. One demon is a good as any; as he told Barrow, there was nothing to lose. Perhaps there was one thing left, and even that was elusive to him. He could still lose his sanity entirely. He glimpsed of a long, seemingly never-ending tightrope that connected him and his goal of getting his people's eyes back from these so-called "people of science." Barrow was wrong. He was not free to leave. He felt a weighty obligation fall on his shoulders. These clones are still living duplicates being toyed around with in this abysmal Project. He should not feel bound to them, and yet he did.

When this clone, this woman, this _thing_ with his mother's face swept her gaze from the ground he stood on to the hair on his head, and finally when she met his eyes, he felt revulsion and a strange tenderness grow within him at the same time.

He was not entirely sure if his presence had any effect on the clone. He held his ground as the woman continued to scrutinize him. He flitted his gaze for a moment to the mirror where Barrow stood at the other side. He only saw a reflection of himself and how unkempt he looked, as well as the clone's reflection and how pristine she looked in contrast to him.

Kurapica had read many books, but he knew next to nothing about human cloning. He had held the notion in utter distaste when he first read about it, and avoided the subject altogether. But what does that matter now? Tournay and Barrow kept going on and on about how the Kurata clones could be an exception. Was he willing to test their theories? He had already agreed to step into their little playground. They had awoken a clone of his mother. They would wake the clone of his father. Forty other Kurata clones awaited their fate as they slumbered peacefully in their capsules. Would he just leave this accursed place to burn in hell? He knew the answer: there was no turning back.

He once more regarded his mother's clone. Kurapica felt a knot form in his stomach when the clone began to show visible signs of emotion. Her forehead wrinkled, her mouth slightly fell open. Her hands jerked slightly at her sides, as if she wanted to lift them but thought otherwise. Kurapica swallowed hard. Was the clone finally registering the memory of him into her mind?

Keeping his voice firm but only slightly gentle, he asked of the clone: "Do you know where you are?"

He felt like a fool immediately afterwards. Would the clone remember to speak? Would the clone remember that, in another lifetime, she was an adult who had learned many skills and gained many habits? Then again, what did he know? Why did he _care_? Yet he plowed through.

"Do you know where you are?" he repeated, more slowly. His eyes widened a little when the woman met his gaze once more. His mother's clear grey eyes stared back at him, but the furrow on her brow never left. To his surprise, the clone sluggishly but daintily shook her head.

He snapped his gaze to the mirror. If any of the scientists saw that, they were very close to proving their theory. He remained speechless for a while as he observed the clone follow his gaze until she glimpsed the mirror. She was puzzled for a moment when she finally did see herself on the mirror, but just as quickly as her eyes met her reflection, she darted them away again, back to him.

The knot in his stomach had moved to his throat. He knew it was a question he had to ask, theories be damned. He wanted to know for himself and himself alone. He felt squalidly selfish for a moment before he recomposed himself and found his voice.

He lowered it considerably, to mimic a whisper. "Do… do you know who I am?"

The woman did not seem to acknowledge the question. She stood there, almost unmoving, and then, to Kurapica's astonishment, she began to slowly walk forward.

_Hold your ground_, Kurapica thought to himself, even as he wanted to leave the ghastly room where the clone was, right at that moment. _Hold your ground_.

The woman finally lifted a hand; it stopped inches away from his face. Her outstretched fingers folded one by one until her pointer finger was the only one left.

"I—" the woman began.

Kurapica's heart fell. That was indeed his mother's voice.

"I kn-know you," the clone finally formed the words. She still looked confused, dazed, and more than a bit lost, as if discovering her newfound knowledge was strange to her.

"Who am I?" Kurapica found his voice again. Why was he urging the clone on? There was just an obstinate part of him that wanted to _know._

The expression on the woman changed. There was a light that danced on her face somehow. It was as if a veil had lifted itself from her mind. And that was when Kurapica really knew that whatever Tournay, Barrow, and the lot of them had been trying to prove about their theory on memory, had been proven.

"I… remember." The clone intoned. Her voice was airy, but there was a traceable _happiness_ in it. Her outstretched arm retracted only so that she can level her hand just a little below her shoulders. "But… you… used to just be this high."

It could have been a funny turn of events, but only a coldness crept into Kurapica's insides. _Hold your ground_, he repeated to himself.

He had been speaking the Kurata language in all that time. And the woman understood, and she spoke it herself.

This was too much.

"You…" he began. "You're not my mother."

He knew he had failed himself when he turned away and walked out of the room, and did not stop until he was back in the area where Barrow and the rest of the scientists were. When he finally reached the now more crowded room behind the one-sided mirror, he grabbed at the wall to steady himself. Barrow warily walked to his side.

"It was more than you can handle," he said quietly. This man had grown a level of sympathy for him, Kurapica knew. This man seemed different. He hadn't entirely trusted Barrow yet, but there was something about the man that was warmly forgiving, and he quite reminded him of Senritsu. When he confided in Barrow, it had been a risk. But the loneliness had won over.

"You saw what happened," Kurapica stated.

Barrow nodded. "Everyone saw what happened, Kurapica."

"Indeed, that's quite true!" Tournay's voice filled the room. The older man walked up to them. Kurapica tried to glance at the mirror-window once again, but he noticed that the lights had been turned up brighter, so that he barely saw the other room and the occupant inside it. "Well, that wasn't so bad, was it?"

_Damn you_, Kurapica wanted to say, but instead he answered with a, "Yes." He gritted his teeth. Will Tournay ever wipe that damnable smile off his face?

"It seems that you've found your footing in the grand scheme of things, eh?" Tournay dribbled on. "What you did there turned out better than I could have imagined. You even spoke in your native tongue! Music to the ears. That was good work, my boy!"

"Zan, Kurapica looks tired. And I think he is, considering that he hasn't given a damn about you keeping on with this 'my boy' business," bantered Francis Barrow. He was only half-joking, but it was true. Kurapica was tired, and he hadn't felt so tired in days. He felt drained that he even thought that the rage had drained out of him as well. Just this morning, he wanted to cut all their throats. Now he just wanted to close his eyes and sleep a deep, dreamless sleep.

"Ah, that's why I'm reserving tomorrow to wake Dad up, huh," Tournay quipped animatedly. "See, there you go—waking one had already been a riot. Think about how things could've turned out if we've waken a dozen of them in one go."

"Zan, that's enough. Please," Barrow insisted.

"Francis, you're a hopeless bore," Tournay continued to jape. "All right, I guess that's enough excitement for one day. Kurapica, if you now had given up the notion of killing us all in our sleep, you can stay in the facility for as long as you like!"

"And you're _still_ an incorrigible ass, Zan," Barrow retorted lightly. He turned to Kurapica, and the boy acknowledged the man, though he felt that he had wandered into a state of being near-catatonic once more.

"You know, he's right," Kurapica uttered. "I can still very well wipe you all out in your sleep."

"Then do us all a favor and kill Tournay first," Barrow suggested. Kurapica stopped short. Was the man joking? But Barrow had turned to him and he smiled, a smile of jesting and warmth.

For the first time since Kurapica can remember, he felt a sliver of a smile form at a corner of his lips. He felt like a simpleton when he found himself at loss for words.

"The men who escorted you down here would most likely be the same men who'll escort you to your quarters, Kurapica," Barrow said. He moved to check his watch. "It's nearing ten in the evening. Call it a day."

"Will you really be waking my father's clone tomorrow?" Kurapica sputtered before he could stop himself. He inwardly cringed with how so much he sounded like a child.

Barrow's expression changed, then he shook his head and sighed. "Frankly, I'm still against it. But it's really up to you, Kurapica, even when Zan thinks he can always get his way for being a senior member of the Project."

"It is," Kurapica acquiesced. "It us up to me."

Kurapica knew that he had left Barrow wondering about his words when everyone turned in for the night.

However, even he himself wondered about his own words.

* * *

Francis Barrow was one of the last men who left the underground facility. Only Dr. Rinder and five security agents had to remain in lab, among the recuperating rooms, where they contained the clone of Kurapica's mother. The boy had long gone from the facility; Barrow was surprised with how the boy took off with the men who escorted him, without protest or hesitation. Did the boy want to put as much distance as he can between himself and the clone? Or was the he too lost in his meanderings to care about his surroundings?

Barrow finished the last sentences of his log, where he had taken down notes of the earlier events. His encounter with the last naturally-born, living Kurata was far too complex to just put in mere "observational data." If the log enabled him to make imprints of his emotions rather than his thoughts, it would have been far more accurate. As it is, he had to do with simple words.

He decided to work under the light of the reservatory's viewing room; somehow he felt a definite, odd comfort of having the Kurata clone capsules in his sight. At a far end the capsule of Kurapica's father's clone remained suspended in a half-lying position, definitely standing out among the identical rows of silver, dimly-lighted capsules. The place looked dreary, cold, and lifeless. The clones slumbered on; in the days to come, which ones would next be subjugated to the fate that the first wakened clone had and will continue to undergo?

He shook his head briskly to get rid of bothersome thoughts. He saved the log with a tap on his tablet and was about to leave when the door of the viewing room slid open. It was Tournay, and Barrow gave an inward sigh of minor irritation.

"Francis, loosen up. You've been acting like a beleaguered little owl ever since the Kurata kid came in," Tournay exclaimed before Barrow said a word, remaining in one of his good moods.

"Kurapica."

"What's that?"

"The 'Kurata kid' has a name, Zan."

"Hmmm," Tournay held his chin for a minute, while his other hand was slid in one of his coat pockets. "Are we being quite sentimental about the boy, Francis?"

"Well, it was Dr. Henri, after all, who did name this the 'Sentiment Experiment,' once upon a time," Francis replied. "And Zan, while I can't stop you from treating the boy like some mere fragment of your research, you can at least _try_ to be concerned about his welfare."

"Touching," Tournay chuckled. "I do admit; I'm quite fond of the youngster. Spirited, highly intelligent, calculated yet impulsive—"

"Would you rather write the log?" Barrow offered. "Zan, the boy could very well be your grandson. He could very well be my own son."

"I've always admired the paternal streak in you, Dr. Barrow," Tournay returned. "If I recall, you're only about fourteen or fifteen years older than the boy. You could, then, have been his teenage father."

"Lovely joke, Zan."

"Many thanks."

"Now, Francis," Tournay went on, reverting to a more serious, even hushed tone, but a shard of amusement still shone in his eyes. "I've seen you treat the boy. I've heard the words you said. I'll let them pass for now since I did practically give each member of the team free reign over their own behavior in the Project."

"What would be your point?"

"Piece of friendly advice, Francis," Tournay said. "Don't get too attached to the boy. It would be to your own disadvantage."

"Now you're telling me to do, you cunning, old bastard," Francis remarked. In better days he would have said it with more affection.

"You're welcome." Tournay then grinned. "Well, looks like you were wrapping up. I leave you know to your own devices, Dr. Barrow." Tournay set to leave. "Have a good night."

* * *

"Good sleep?" Barrow asked of the young man. Kurapica made a face for a moment before returning to his breakfast.

"Me neither," said Barrow to Kurapica's unspoken reply.

Kurapica had been invited to have breakfast with them, and the boy unceremoniously joined the team in their gathering, stony faced, but with a small amount of uneasiness. There were five new faces apart from the five scientists he first encountered the day before. Tournay mentioned that there were "about sixteen of them." The huge pantry contained ten.

From the corner of his eye he could see how the five new faces often stared at him and talked in low, excited whispers. Rinder, the man who had the jitters in his presence, was eyeing him nervously from his coffee cup. Introductions have been made; the scientists tried to be friendly, but he brushed them off. He did not feel at that moment to be ascribed to any of them. But Barrow, the persistent one, took the liberty of sitting by his side, with, of course, a considerable distance away. Tournay, on the other hand, casually read a periodical on his tiny laptop on a far end of the table, detachedly humming an obscure tune.

Against his will, that night, images of his mother's clone played in his mind. He should have known better than to shut out the very reason he lost control of his level-headedness the day before. He was never good at shutting out any past occurrences. He fiddled the scrambled eggs on his plate, not really in the mood to enjoy any of the food. Save for one instance, he never wore his Nen chains in the facility. Somehow he felt that there was no need to use them, at least for now. They also seemed so out of place. Nen may not be a strange phenomenon to these people of science, but they'd rather focus on more tangible, measurable subjects.

_Like me_, he thought. He marveled at how he regarded the matter casually.

"Don't worry, they treated her well," Barrow said, out of the blue. Kurapica knew he was referring to the clone.

"I wasn't asking."

"I made a good guess that it was in your mind." The voice was gentle.

"It doesn't matter. I'll be seeing two clones today, am I not?"

"When you're ready."

"Nothing to lose."

"I'll have to say, that's quite a strange mantra to keep," Barrow admitted. "But if that settles you down…"

"It does."

Barrow smiled. "Very well."

A new face—a certain Dr. Rasken Henri, approached them, gave a nod to Kurapica which, naturally, the boy did not acknowledge, then bent to speak to Barrow in a low whisper. Henri then wordlessly left.

"This is quite sooner than we thought," Barrow muttered.

"What is?" Kurapica's curiosity moved to the forefront.

"Your mother's clone," Barrow said. "She's finally asked for you by name. She seems to have now remembered a great deal about you."

Kurapica dropped his fork.

"And she wishes to see you."

The boy was silent. It seems like a few of them knew, or had a faint idea, of the Kurata language to have understood what the clone spoke.

"Will you go?"

Kurapica quietly stood up, lightly brushed his tunic and turned to Barrow. "Take me to her, then."

The walk to the containment facility wasn't as arduous as he expected. Tournay, of course, was with them, then Barrow, the scientist named Monroe, and Henri. When they reached the recovery rooms, the security agents seemed to hand each one of them a suit, and attached to the white suits were hooded masks, with dark eye visors.

"What are those?" the boy asked.

"Ah, these?" It was Tournay to brightly reply. "Well, you're not wearing one, my boy. Only we are. You see, it's to make us all look identical. We've been looking like this every time we went to your Mom's clone in person."

"New faces will faze her," the man named Monroe volunteered. His voice was rough but like Ryger, soft-spoken. "At this point your face is the only one she needs to see."

"Interesting way to test your theory," Kurapica remarked.

"Well, as you've heard, it's been most effective so far!" Tournay beamed.

This time, none of the scientists went to the surveillance room where the one-sided mirror was. They all stopped in front of the door of the clone's room.

"Ready, gentlemen?" Tournay said from behind the white hooded mask. He slid a pair of white latex gloves on his hands.

So precise, so methodological, it was almost a farce.

The door slid open and sure enough, the woman was there, and she stood up in unison with the sliding doors, and when Kurapica stepped in, she placed her hand just below her chest, on her abdomen—Kurapica noted that it was a habit his mother had when she was nervous or anxious.

"Kurapica?" The woman finally called.

Kurapica cringed; he swallowed hard. The clone did indeed remember his name.

"Yes," he replied.

"Who are these people? Where am I? They won't speak to me," she said, a bit alarmed, but she stood where she was, as if unsure whether or not she would approach the boy. There was reason for her not to. Four masked and suited figures, all looking identical, were behind him.

"You're in a laboratory." He was determined not to call the clone by any name, least of all his mother's name. Least of all, to call her _mother_. "These are scientists."

The woman frowned, seemingly taken aback by his coldness. "I don't understand. I wake up and here I am…"

Kurapica wondered, _how far back does she remember? What were her memories before she woke up to this little nightmare?_

"And where my clothes?" the woman asked. "I don't like what I'm wearing. Your father says that grey doesn't become me. Too dull."

Kurapica was not sure how to react or what to say to that comment. So she's remembered his father as well—even as she had not seen his father yet?

One the masked scientists walked forward to hand her something: a bundle of traditional Kurata garb, judging from the colors and patterns, even as they were neatly folded.

"Oh…" the woman said, reluctantly taking the bundle. "I don't really know who or what you are, but thank you."

_She's taking this too calmly_, Kurapica thought. Then again, his mother loved novel experiences.

"You think I could change alone?" the woman requested, sweetly, tranquilly.

Kurapica inadvertly turned to the nearest figure beside him. It nodded. It gave a signal which Kurapica guessed was, _Give her privacy_. They all marched out, and before Kurapica left the room, the female clone called him again.

"Kurapica, are we in the outside world?"

Kurapica partially turned to her, but his back was already towards her. "Yes."

"Don't tell your father," she suddenly quipped. "He'll be furious, you know."

The boy tried to steady his heartbeat. So much like his mother, indeed. When the door slid behind him, and the scientists had finally taken off their masks—they were saying something, but he was too bemused to make out what they were telling him—and he took a deep breath.

At the back of his mind, a fine line stood before him. He was not certain if he should cross it.

* * *

**A/N: **The fic seems to be going slower than I thought! Harrumph. :( Oh well, just keep writing, just keep writing… :P

I'd be glad to know what you guys think so far! Do leave reviews, comments, reactions, greetings, etc. :D Drop a word or two! :)

Cheers!

DW-chan :3


	5. Five: Vial Filial

***HxH Disclaimer***

**Author's Notes:** Really not sure how humor can fit in any of these chapters after the story has been serious so far, but then, the anime/manga themselves have serious tones and all of a sudden—boom—comic relief. ^^;;; Oh well, I'm not gonna force it that much if it doesn't work. xD

I've always spelled it as "Kuruta" until now, when I saw the alternative spelling, "Kurata," in volume 0 of the HxH manga ("Kurapica's Memories"). Then again, his name is spelled "Kurapika," but eh, don't wanna get too meticulous about it. I do what I want! AHAHAHA

Thanks again to Bai-Feng, and then to complicatedmind21 and a guest reader for commenting on/reviewing my story! :D Awesomesauce.

Moving this fic here forward. ^^

* * *

Living Things  
By: DW-chan

**_Five: Vial Filial_**

"How were you born?" a teacher once asked Kurapica in class. That had been many years ago, when he was safely back in his Kurata village, when everyone was alive and well.

Kurapica gave an answer quite detailed enough to send the teacher frowning and the rest of the class snickering. The teacher afterwards called him after class and Kurapica had to explain that he read the books of the older students in school.

"I'd rather that than those trash novels from the outside world," the teacher had muttered, thinking that Kurapica had not heard.

He had never really given much thought how "trash novels from the outside world" explained the process of birth, but it was certainly not the same process Tournay and the rest of the scientists revealed to him when they huddled back in a brightly-lit room, much like a conference room, when they had left the clone to change into her preferable clothing in private.

He wasn't asking for an explanation of the process, but they gave it to him anyway. He might have as well, since, as Barrow proclaimed, "He has every right to know." Tournay had given Barrow a small, reproachful look which could easily be missed, but Tournay obliged: cell extraction from the eyes, cultivation in different stages, "And, of course, artificial age acceleration," Tournay concluded with a gleam in his eye. "Something that has never been successfully done to any clone since the Institute approved of the process."

Kurapica kept a stoic veneer as he was being told all this. When Tournay began to explain how they fused each pair of eyes back to their clone-owners followed by, "And without the hard work of Dr. Monroe and Dr. Barrow, this wouldn't have been possible," Kurapica instinctively turned to Barrow; one of his fists clenched, and for a moment he thought of materializing his chains. But Barrow had a grim, almost sad look on his face while he acknowledged the mention of his name with a nod.

"Of course, the Project has been strictly classified into utmost secrecy for the past five years. What we've done had only been recently legalized, and no one else has attempted to successfully clone human beings, but our team. Only, of course, a special race of human beings. Don't you think?" Tournay continued on with his customary smile. Kurapica remained passive.

"The Scarlet Eyes are truly a gem in every aspect of the word," a voice from the far side of the room, yet another scientist named Dr. Skev, added jovially. "It's made everything we did easier, and go more smoothly. Imagine: what could have more than twenty years of work condensed in five years!"

Tournay moved in front of him, and since Kurapica was seated, he had to lean a bit over so his voice could reach him. "You can say, my boy, that your people didn't die in vain, and left a precious legacy behind them. This discovery would contribute to the scientific field in all the biggest ways possible!"

"If you put it that way," Kurapica replied, detachedly.

Tournay grinned and moved away. Just then, another scientist—this time, a female scientist close to Tournay's age who had been introduced to Kurapica as "Dr. Meeks" entered the room briskly through the sliding glass doors. "Everything's ready," she announced to the team; immediately, they shuffled out, but Kurapica remained in his seat for a while longer. Barrow was on his way out, but noticed the boy's disposition. The man looked around, as though he were on a lookout for something, or someone, then approached Kurapica.

"I know you have questions," Barrow said softly. "If you—"

"I don't want your answers," Kurapica cut him off tersely.

Barrow nodded gently. The sad, grim expression on his face had not faded. "I understand." He walked away a bit further before he turned back. "Will you join us?"

Kurapica looked up, as if Barrow asked an unnecessary question. "Of course."

* * *

However, the team did not go back to Kurapica's mother's clone. A number of them made their way to reservatory, and that was where they led Kurapica.

"Dad's turn now," Tournay lively declared.

Kurapica did not mean to give him a questioning look, which the older scientist quickly detected, so he said, "Well, Mom seems all settled down for now, so why don't we give Dad a shot?"

Tournay had quite a despicable habit of calling the clones 'Mom' and 'Dad' when he referred them to Kurapica, as though he were but a very small child; Kurapica had decided to give it little regard until now. _Mom. Dad._ The clones had their faces, but were they his parents? _Copies_, he thought. _They are but copies_.

"Capsule twenty-seven," Tournay repeated, and Ryger was there once more, his small silver box of syringes in hand. Tournay smiled at Kurapica, his wrinkles and perfectly-formed teeth showing every time he did so. "After you, my boy."

Capsule twenty-seven was already prepped and in position when they arrived to it. Once again it was only Tournay, Ryger, and Barrow who accompanied him. While Ryger followed through the same process he had done when they woke his mother's clone, Kurapica slowly made his way to the front of the capsule even without any of their bidding.

They were successful in approximating his father's age, it seemed. Kurapica's father never considered himself a handsome man, merely an average-looking one; however, as the clone half-lay there, eyes closed, Kurapica saw how much he had inherited his father's nose, his ears, and a bit of his jaw. Strange, how he never really noticed that before. His father had always remarked how much he resembled his mother, and that had always stuck to him ever since. The clone that lay there had his father's gentle face.

"Ready?" Tournay said, and with a few taps on his tablet once more, the glass case slid open, and Ryger injected the serum into the clone's neck.

Kurapica watched as the clone's eyes flickered open, revealing his father's sharp but misty grey eyes. Like his mother's clone, the male clone's gaze was unfocused and blank at first, but having gone through the initial experience with the first clone they ever awakened, this ordeal seemed less agonizing… perhaps.

Kurapica somehow couldn't find himself to look into his father's eyes. He looked down to the clone's hands, which were making tiny movements. He could hear the clone's breathing. Kurapica closed his eyes for a moment before opening them again, unsure of what he wanted to feel. To his puzzlement, however, the clone's right hand began to visibly move, and it slowly rose a little. Kurapica froze. He was only a mere foot away from the clone.

Barrow seemed slightly distressed, and was inclined to move forward before Tournay stopped him by cutting off his way with a raised hand. No one spoke as per protocol. They were only making expressions, movements. The most freedom was given to him—Kurapica.

The clone's hand was raised midway, and Kurapica knew, even as he felt his body feel like lead, that he needed to look up to the clone's face. Slowly, he raised his eyes. The clone was looking straight at him, still rather blank, but his breathing patterns sounded like he wanted to say something but couldn't do it, or felt something, but couldn't express it accordingly.

Kurapica didn't know what else to do, but only simply echoed what he did to his mother's clone. "Do you know where you are?" he asked, nearly automatically, in the Kuratan language, in a low voice.

The clone raised his eyebrows a little, as if to greet the voice. Then, without warning, the clone struggled to get out. Its breathing was slightly panicked; the hands gripped the sides of the open capsule.

There was palpable tension in the air the three scientists seemed a bit flustered, until Tournay gave the signal to just stay where they were. The clone continued to struggle, clearly disoriented, and finally, he was able to step out of the capsule and onto the floor. The clone fell forward; Kurapica stepped back in reflex. For a moment he made no move to help the clone up and he stood there, nearly as agitated as the man before him.

His father's clone lay there for a while, and it sounded like he was catching his breath. For some time, the clone just lay still; then he began to lift himself up with much effort.

Kurapica gritted his teeth and lunged forward to help the man up to his feet. The clone's skin was warm to the touch, but the body trembled ever so slightly. Then the man lifted his face up.

Kurapica was indeed looking at his father's face: warm-toned, with lightly rough skin, dark hair, and the same ponderous grey eyes. The clone was looking at him now, and his gaze was focused and steady. Then his eyes began to move; first to look at Kurapica's hair, then to down to what the boy was wearing. He turned his attention briefly to the hands that supported his shoulders before returning it to the boy's face again.

Kurapica let the clone scrutinize him for a moment before he whispered, "Do you know who I am?"

The man was unresponsive at first. He gripped Kurapica's elbows for support; then the clone began to survey his surroundings; before long, he caught sight of the three men that surrounded him and the youth. For some reason, the scientists no longer wore the suits and hooded masks, which made them look more like monsters than men.

The grip on Kurapica's elbows tightened. The man looked back at Kurapica with a clearly confused expression. His mouth opened with a small sound.

"You…" the man began. The man's eyes surveyed his features once more before speaking again. "You look so much like my son, but he's only twelve…"

Kurapica could hear the excited shuffling of Tournay and Ryger, but so far, there seemed to be no reaction from Barrow. Kurapica did not turn to any of them. He only kept his attention to the man who had his father's face.

"Who are you?" The man continued to speak in his gentle voice. "Do I know you?"

Kurapica thought for a moment before replying, "My name is Kurapica."

The man's eyes widened. The grip on Kurapica's elbows loosened, but the man's hands began to move to the boy's shoulders, just as Kurapica had his hands on the man's shoulders. When finally the man had a grip on the youth's shoulders, it was firm but not overbearing. A smile inched its way on the man's lips, and then the man gasped, sounding like brief, wondrous laughter. "Kurapica?"

The boy nodded.

The man's grip now moved its way to the sides of his shoulders. "You… my son? You're… you've grown! You've grown taller, but you're my son, my son…"

"I'm not your son," Kurapica blurted out before he could stop himself.

The man's expression gradually changed, as though he did not understand or did not believe what the boy just said. "But… I know that face! It's your mother's face, your mother's eyes! My son—"

"Let me go," Kurapica said slowly. Not ungently, he loosened the man's grip from the sides of his shoulders. "Please."

The man, in his confusion, nodded abstractedly. His gaze was far away before he finally let go of Kurapica. There was evident sadness in the man's eyes.

"Thank you," said Kurapica, softly. There was a lump in his throat, a knot in his chest.

"I-I'm sorry," the man whispered. He blinked many times, as if trying to clear his head. "But you look so much like my son, and you have his name… but it couldn't be, just couldn't. My son is a child, a child of twelve." The clone regarded Kurapica fully again, the agitation still on his face. "Could you please tell me where I am? I'm certainly not home. I don't know where I am."

"You're in a laboratory," Kurapica said once more, just as he had told his mother's clone.

"I've never heard of that before," the man replied. Then his turned his attention to Tournay, Ryger, and Barrow who was a substantial distance away from the boy. "Are they people you know?"

"Yes."

"Kurapica," the man began once more. "I hope we're not in the outside world?" It was a question.

"I'm afraid we are," Kurapica answered with a little hesitation.

The man's eyes widened once more. His eyes were slightly slanted, almond-shaped; Kurapica wondered if he might have gotten a bit of his father's eyes as well. "We are?" He then lowered his voice. "This is bad. What will my wife say?"

Instead of the remark startling the boy, it only sent something like warmth creep into the boy's heart. Kurapica could not help but faintly and simply smile.

* * *

"I don't think you can fool him for long, Kurapica," Barrow told the boy gently as Tournay and Ryger begin to lead his father's clone to the recovery quarters. Tournay had requested Kurapica to relay to the clone that they "meant no harm" and "will help him to his feet" among other niceties, to which Kurapica replied with a, "He'd known the common tongue," to which they began to address the man, indeed, with the common language. The man seemed to understand and, with one last look at the boy, he acquiesced and went with the scientists.

"I don't think so, either," Kurapica said. There was little emotion in the youth's voice. "No one but I knew that my father learned the common tongue."

"Kurapica," Barrow continued, "We've now come to discover that the last memories they held aren't as recent as we thought. They remember you from five years ago, but they don't seem to have remembered that—"

"They were killed?" Kurapica finished. "Naturally."

"You're sounding more and more like one of us," Barrow joked, but he immediately knew it was not something he should have said to the young man. Kurapica narrowed his eyes with apparent displeasure, but the boy refrained from verbally reacting.

"We… we had planned to tell the clones the truth of their situation," Barrow finally admitted. "But that is if they had remembered the final events before they found themselves here."

"So you want me to do your job instead?" Kurapica replied, but it was a knowing one. Barrow wondered how the boy could be so perceptive to the point of nearly mind-reading. The boy must have a skill much like his own when it came to reading expressions.

"That was Plan B," Barrow admitted once more with a small smile.

"Will there be a Plan C?" Kurapica asked, but Barrow surmised that it was both out of mockery and curiosity.

"No, Kurapica, at least for now," Barrow replied. "We only have Plan B."

"I don't seem to have much of a choice, then," Kurapica said with a matter-of-fact sigh. "Will my father's clone see my mother's clone?"

"Only when you are with them both," said Barrow.

Kurapica turned to Barrow in full regard, with something between amusement and disgust in his eyes. "You seem to have had everything planned out."

"I wish I could really confirm that," was Barrow's honest answer.

"Did you want me to see them now?" Kurapica asked. The boy sounded like someone who was folding up his sleeves in preparation to do a procedure.

"Kurapica, it seems I can't really tell you what to do," Barrow admitted once more, but there was humor in his tone.

"Oh, that's right," Kurapica said, with a tenuous tilt in his voice. "I have nothing to lose."

* * *

_Clones are mere copies of the original specimen. They have the exact physical characteristics of the genetic donor. Once fully developed, they, however, have no memories owned by their genetic donor. If the genetic donor happens to be deceased, they will retain no memories of the deceased genetic donor's as well. Fully-developed clones begin in the infancy stage, but with the proper cell and tissue stimulation, the ages of their bodies can be accelerated, but their cognitive capacities will remain that of an infant's._

_Their minds are clean slates from "birth."_

_There have not been any known procedures in which memories of the genetic donors can be transferred into the clones, nor there has been any process in which the cognitive and learning capacities of the age-accelerated clone can be adjusted accordingly. _

_Moreover, there has not been a clone that has successfully lived past the infancy stage. There have not been any known cases in which a clone has lived to adulthood._

Until now.

Barrow counter-signed a number of statements which they have confirmed in opposition to the known theories on cloning which the Institute had kept for more than ten years.

He rubbed the back of his neck and sighed. He could not keep his mind to his work.

In a few hours, Kurapica will be meeting both his parents' clones in one room. His parents' clones would be seeing each other for the first time since death had separated their "original bodies."

Wait; that was something to consider.

They have seen Kurapica and they only remembered him as a child, alive and well; Kurapica had survived and he had not joined them when they perished.

Would their memories come more recently if the clones meet each other for the first time?

They had made sure that when both the clones woke up, the rest of the sleeping clones were not in sight. The capsules' tints were activated so it only seemed like they were surrounded by oddly-shaped furniture. The capsules only stayed that way until the wakened clones were no longer in the vicinity. Kurapica had only noticed the process when they revived his father's clone, and had understood, albeit grudgingly, and did not speak of it afterwards.

_Memories are a fragile thing_, Barrow mused. Too fragile to be mixed around in a beaker then poured out into living beings.

If the clones finally remember their deaths, what now? Everything had been ironed out, but even as Barrow wished to believe that they had measured everything they could, and considered every possibility so far, he knew that a lot of blind faith has been placed on the Project. Part of it was a sin against science. All of it was human nature.

So many lives were at stake, and he was not just talking about the lives of the Project team. It was Kurapica's life. It was the clones' lives, every single one of them.

And all because one day he, along with Tournay, Ryger, the other scientists, decided to mix chemicals and genes in a vial.

Barrow closed his eyes as he kept on recalling the words the Kurata youth echoed time and again.

_I have nothing to lose._

* * *

**A/N: **Eh, so this chapter is still dark and serious. Oh well, there's always the next chapter, for sure. :3

I've also noticed so far that most of my OCs are male, and adult. I'm not sure what exactly I'm projecting here but I hope my OCs so far are relatable characters and fit into the canon, so to speak! ^^;;;;

Keep the reviews coming! Just about five chapters (maybe) so stay tuned. ^^

Cheers!

DW-chan :3


	6. Six: Measurable

***HxH Disclaimer***

**Author's Notes:** Thanks to my readers and most especially my reviewers so far! :) I reply to all my reviews as much as possible, but through PM so I can babble as much as I want without flooding the chapters with author's notes. :P

I noticed that the number of readers progressively lessen each chapter. ^^;;; I'm quite aware that my choice of plot and theme aren't too popular, but has gained interest of a few whom I'm very thankful for. ^^ Nevertheless, I'm continuing the fic (though progress might slow down by next week due to finals the week after T.T) and completing it. :)

I'll try to make this chapter a _bit_ more light-hearted. ^^ Sixth chapter takeoff! xD

* * *

Living Things  
By: DW-chan

_**Six: Measurable**_

_Hello. As you know my name is Kurapica. You were once my parents who died, but now you're here, you've been cloned from my parents, and I think you have their memories now. But you're not my parents, really. You just look like them._

It would have been easier for his twelve-year old self to express such wide-eyed explanation to the situation. Of course, Kurapica knew better than to use the spiel that had been playing in his head like a wind-up toy for the past hour. He mentally shook his head, acknowledging one of the rare moments when his calculating nature ceased to fluently allege itself. He, however, was surprised that despite not exactly knowing what to do, he was calm, collected. His fingers were knotted but he was only minimally nervous.

He found his mother's clone settled in a different room, which was visibly decorated somehow; a dark blue carpet lined the floor, a painting of idyllic scenery hung by a far wall, there was a dresser table seemingly made of wood by the bedside, and the bed—that's where he found her sitting. She seemed to be folding pieces of garment, her hands darting around the cloth, very much like what his mother would do when he watched her fold the laundry. She looked up when he came into her room, and he puzzled over how much she did it so naturally, without missing a beat from her folding.

"I think this is a dream," the woman began in his mother's melodic voice, somewhat strained, but acclimatizing a larger measure of calm. She smiled, stopping her folding for a minute. "I don't really remember having so much well-tailored clothes, because you know—I'm not much of a seamstress, really. Did you have those made by your aunt?"

Kurapica realized that he had been gripping the sides of his tabard. He loosened his grip and replied, "They were made by her."

"Well, wherever she is, she doesn't seem to be in my dream," the clone continued matter-of-factly. She looked about, as if in awe. "You know, I've had dreams of the outside world before, but none of them like this. Then again, I've never been to the outside world. This version is a little strange. But who's to say dreams are ever normal?"

His mother had always been fond of talking. She was the livelier one, the bolder one, the sweeter one. Kurapica didn't really know what to respond to the clone. He simply nodded. How could he break it to her that this wasn't a dream?

She went on. "Quite a long dream, actually. I don't think I've ever woken in between. I think I've slept, or I'm dreaming that I've slept then I woke up again…" Her lips curled in confusion. There was a moment of silence before she seemed to snap out of a reverie and acknowledge Kurapica's presence again. Her smile widened, grew happier, and just as sweet. She patted the space beside her, inviting the boy to have a seat.

"I'd rather not," was what Kurapica wanted to say, and yet he found himself walking to the bed and sitting beside the woman with his mother's young and beautiful face. _She had always been beautiful_, Kurapica thought. Come to think of it, he had never told his mother that she was beautiful.

"Let's see, how old are you?"

"Seventeen."

"Imagine that! No one told me I could see the future." There was a glint of humor in her eyes. "When I wake up, I'll tell Kurapica that I saw you. His seventeen-year-old self. He'll be thrilled to know that he'd grow more handsome."

Kurapica blinked, not really knowing if a pleased smile should fit the occasion. He didn't exactly fight the occasion, he realized. It felt like a movie was playing before him, and he was simply a bystander witnessing events through the eyes of another person, if that even made sense. However, to his surprise, it wasn't an unpleasant feeling. Mother or not, it was a living being before him. He could not treat it any less, or so he thought.

"You've been awfully quiet. Maybe I can request my dream-son to talk a bit more?" the woman said in his mother's carefree manner.

_I missed you_, were the words that formed in his mind.

Where did _that_ come from?

If he told that to the clone, would she understand?

Maybe, maybe not. But now that he had set a sieve to his mind, he felt that such mawkishness seemed unnecessary. He knew that there were cameras playing somewhere, or maybe microphones that recorded their conversation—devices that reminded him that he was in a place where everything was observed and measured.

He knew that he had to do what he came here to see the clone for. He had to say it, and not believe that he was saying it to upset her. "You're not in a dream," he said softly. He tried not to leave the gaze of the woman's eyes, if only to catch her reaction.

And she did react. As if she misheard what the youth said, her brows furrowed once again, just as they had when she recognized him for the first time. She looked down and around, as though to find an answer elsewhere—maybe from the pair of slippers on her feet, maybe from the pillows on her bed.

"Well, I don't see how else this could _not_ be a dream," she immediately said afterwards. She made confused gestures with her hands, swinging one of them impassively. "My son is seventeen and I'm in the outside world." She faced him once more, a hint of dark glee returning to her face. "I'll be telling Kurapica too that his seventeen-year-old self is a real kidder. Just like his father when he isn't too crabby." She laughed an airy laugh, partly with disbelief, partly with bewilderment. "It's hard business, dreaming about the future!"

"This is the present," Kurapica deadpanned, determined to get this over with.

"You're lying," the clone said outright, a suppressed panic in her features.

"How far do you remember?" Kurapica asked, genuinely wanting to know, vainly brushing aside what the woman had just told him a moment ago. At least he now knew that the clone remembered as far as some rudimentary things, like his father, his aunt, how she folded clothes, the dreams she had—He held his breath. She seemed to have almost remembered his mother's entire lifetime. _Almost._

"I don't really know what you mean," the woman remarked. "But if you're asking me what happened before I started… dreaming…" she faltered at the last word. "I…" she was silent for a while.

"You don't remember…" Kurapica offered, not knowing whether to state it as a fact or a question.

"When I wake up," the clone said stubbornly, "I'll be making breakfast for my husband and son, and I'll not remember any of this." She wrung her hands. "Then they'll come home, and I'll be making dinner…" She stopped short. There was silence again.

Kurapica felt a strange tinge of guilt creep up to him. He couldn't even place any righteous fury in himself to the people who subjected this hapless being into the Project. He was once again at loss for words when a beep rung from the door. Both Kurapica and the woman turned their attention to the small commotion as the door slid open.

His father's clone stepped in; behind was Barrow who wordlessly gave Kurapica a nod; his face was kind before he stepped away and the door slid closed again.

"This fellow named Dr. Barrow was thoughtful enough to show me the way here," he intoned, seemingly still disoriented. He, too, had changed out of the grey body suit and into Kurata tribal garb. It dawned to Kurapica that the clothes have been re-made to resemble the ones his parents wore when their bodies were first retrieved by the team. There could have been no other way for the scientists to know what the Kurata had exactly worn.

His mother jumped from the bed, visibly startled. "Well, then, dear, looks like you're in my dream and we're dreaming it together." There was a sliver of bitter drollness in her voice.

"Dream, huh?" the male clone said, looking distractedly at the occupants in the room.

"But your son says this isn't a dream," she continued, suddenly, much to Kurapica's surprise. She flung a hand at him as if to say, _Look at that, he's at it again._

"My son?" the man echoed, looking befuddled. He lifted a finger to scratch the side of his nose. It was one of his father's habits when he was deep in thought.

"Because this isn't a dream," Kurapica repeated, giving his mother's clone a firm look. He felt a funny balminess well up inside him. He was being caught in an all-too familiar mesh which he had encountered many times as a child.

"My son said he wasn't my son," the man argued, jumping into the conversation as though it was the most natural thing in the world. "But if I'm not mistaken, he's _your_ son, too."

"Because I'm not your son," Kurapica tried to utter, which he did, but he felt he didn't sound convincing enough; perhaps it was because exasperation was beginning to join the hodgepodge of emotions which formed in him.

"And this is a dream," the man said. "He's not my son and this is a dream. I guess that makes sense," he pronounced, "even when I feel that it doesn't."

Kurapica sighed. The sigh seemed to have caught the man's attention more effusively, and he directed his words at Kurapica.

"Are you my son or aren't you?" the man inquired in his father's stern voice.

"No, I'm not."

The man nodded, accepting it for a moment.

"This is not a dream?"

"No, it's not."

"A nightmare, then, no doubt," his mother's clone interjected, sounding sullen just as she was confused.

The man crossed his arms, not really knowing what to do or say. His voice remained stern when he said, "I could very well agree that this is a dream. That would be easy to believe, much easier to believe. My wife is here, my son who says he isn't my son is here—" he was starting to sound exasperated, but there was a hint of something with how the man expressed it which made Kurapica unbury a small smile from deep within him. It had been his mother who told him that he got his father's way of thinking. Always trying to find a logical explanation, even when there were times that defied logic. This was one of those times.

"When you're done believing that this is a dream, I can explain everything to you," proffered Kurapica, wanting everything to slide through him like water. He was starting to feel rather disturbed with how marveled he felt about the whole situation. But clones are clones; they had to understand that.

His mother's clone was trying hard not to sound frantic. "I don't really know what to believe. But really, I think I need to hear what you'll have to explain. Because… I really don't know what to believe."

Kurapica moved to another end of the room, and offered his spot on the bed to his father's clone. Instead, however, the man warily took a seat at the tiny chair provided with the bedside table. He should've looked funny sitting on it, but Kurapica's father somehow had always been a regal, no-nonsense man.

"Talk, then," the male clone resigned, still stern, still confused, but seemingly willing all the more to listen.

"Before I go, let me ask you a question: do you really not remember what happened before you woke up?" Kurapica started, crossing his arms, trying to hide how rattled his nerves were, against his will. He tried to take deep breaths, something that he always did to calm his spirits.

As Kurapica's mother's clone slowly shook her head—a gesture which was done half-heartedly, the man started to speak. "I, uh—" he appeared to think first, as if really attempting to remember, and then he resumed, with a rather faraway look in his face, "Sianni here—" 'Sianni' was his mother's name. His mother's name was longer, but his father always called her by her nickname—"was outside; I think she was talking to her sister about… well, I don't exactly remember what they were talking about."

"Her son was having trouble in school again," the woman once named 'Sianni' offered, looking at the man. It seemed as though she was trying to avoid looking at Kurapica, for reasons Kurapica was not certain about.

"I've just come home from work. You—" he said, pointing at Kurapica, then he recanted the gesture as he blinked in a rather factual manner, "or rather, my son, Kurapica, well—about six weeks ago he'd taken an exam to see the outside world, and he passed. Kurapica wasn't home at that time…"

"What else do you remember?" Kurapica probed forward, which he wished he didn't as a sinking feeling began to wash over him. What was he asking of them, exactly? Did he really want them to remember their _deaths_?

"A-and… all of a sudden… There was the warning bell, and then…" the man continued, ostensibly wrapped in recollection. Then, as if from a slap, he looked at the woman, and the woman had a most distraught look on her face. The woman inched her way to the man and had laced her hand around his, and she was breathing hard. The man gripped her hand back, dazedly, but it was clear that he was trying to comfort her, although in an abstract kind of way. They were _remembering._

"I saw your father die," the woman whispered, now looking at Kurapica. "Now, I don't really care what you call yourself, you look so much like my child—I saw your father die…"

A long, heavy, and profound silence followed afterwards.

"My last thoughts were, 'I want my family to live.' And that I love them so much and I want them to live, to be happy…" the man faltered.

"Ianto," the woman said slowly, veritably calling the man by his father's own nickname. "Don't get angry… because my last thoughts were that I love you and that I love Kurapica…"

The man once named 'Ianto' puzzedly turned to the woman once named 'Sianni.' "So you died?"

"I just said, 'last thoughts,'" didn't I?" the woman countered, looking rather offended but the desolate look in her eyes had not faded.

"Well, that's nice." The man seemed a tad disappointed. "And here I thought that I had heroically given up my life for the ones I love."

"Oh." The woman, quite certain that she would not sound very bright, looked once more at Kurapica. "So is this heaven?"

Kurapica could not help but smile, ever so faintly, even as an intense wave of emotions started to well in him. He didn't have to look in a mirror to know that his eyes had turned into their scarlet hue. The clones' eyes began to reflect the same crimson, albeit feebly, as though their emotions had not fully bubbled to the surface yet.

"Like I told you," Kurapica said, his voice low. "You are in the outside world. This is not a dream. And yes, you—" He wasn't quite sure how to regard them as they recalled their final moments. "—died. You were killed. All of you…"

"…I see…" Ianto's trailed off. "Well, the outside world is full of unknown things. So were we resuscitated back to life?"

"In a way, yes," Kurapica answered.

"I can't just accept, an 'in a way,'" the man said, rather frustratedly. "My wife and I would appreciate a better, more concise explanation, if you please, whoever you are."

It rather stung to hear a man who looked exactly like his father, and in his father's voice utter "whoever you are" in a manner of disdain, but he pushed further, and finally revealed their nature in three, simple words: "You are clones."

"We are what?" The man demanded of him; his eyes had fully turned into their scarlet color. He now held his wife—the female clone—close to him.

"Clones. Genetic replicates. I—" Even he could not find any other words to explain everything to them at that very moment. Should he resort to his twelve-year-old reasoning? He continued to fumble until he managed a, "What you remember are memories of a man and a woman named Ianto and Sianni, who died in a massacre five years ago." He strove to go on even as he noted their response to his last set of words. "But you are _not_ Ianto and Sianni. You are their copies, and their memories were successfully transferred to you…"

"What…?"

"I don't know any other way to explain it," Kurapica admitted. "But you are indeed in a laboratory as part of a Project conducted by a team who retrieved Ianto's, Sianni', and forty others' eyes, created new bodies for the eyes, bodies which look exactly like the ones of the original owners, and—" He was incredulous with his own words. Barrow was right. He, after all, was beginning to sound like one of them.

"Ianto, five years." 'Sianni' started, grabbing her husband's sleeve. 'Ianto,' not understanding at first, tenderly held her hand which grabbed at him. However, Kurapica's father had been an intelligent man, so it finally dawned to him.

"Kurapica, you are now seventeen, are you not?"

Kurapica had no choice but to reply. "Yes."

'Ianto' looked at him with a grim expression. "Five years ago, our son was twelve."

Kurapica nodded. He wanted so much to look away from those eyes, now brilliantly crimson in earnest, but he could not.

"So you are indeed Kurapica," the man finally confirmed, though he did not seem so thrilled about the revelation. "Kurapica was away when the attack happened," Ianto mused, still looking at the boy. "_You_ could not have died as well."

Kurapica shook his head. "I lived."

"Kurapica," the male clone said after a long pause, softly, deliberately, as though he were calming down. "When you were five, you came running home with a gash in your hand because you said Ima's puppy bit you."

Kurapica decided against it first, but he nodded anyway.

"I had to take you to the healer, but you resisted, and we struggled to get you there for a day and a half," the man continued. "Your mother told you stories of 'Kiro the Bear Cub' so you finally calmed down."

Kurapica nodded again.

"And—" the man was struggling to speak, but it was not because he had trouble remembering. "When you were eight, I carved you your first pair of tanto. You practiced with them for hours from the moment I gave them to you. You practiced with them everyday, and your mother and I thought you'd forgotten about your books."

Kurapica no longer bobbed his head, nor did he make a movement to assent, but there was something in his own crimson eyes that conceded with the man's words.

"When you were eleven, you and Pairo somehow disappeared into the woods, and then you came back many hours later saying that Pairo had fallen off a cliff—"

Kurapica looked up. So they remember. They remember _everything._

"Yes," Kurapica finally uttered, making no attempt to guess what the man was getting at. He was feeling exhausted, now that the force of his eyes having turned crimson were slowly eating their way into him.

"Then how can you say," the male clone went on, "that you are _not_ my son, and I am _not_ your father?" There was a deep wounded-ness in the voice.

The female clone was rather speechless but Kurapica knew that she had her own fair share of memories about him as well, memories that only his parents knew. "And how can you say that she is _not_ your mother?" demanded of the male clone with a kind of force that was slicing yet temperate. One can almost say that there was a hint of affection in it.

"I—" Kurapica, for the first time in his young life, was too awestricken. His father had seldom compelled his authority upon him, and yet he felt so small, so weak. He felt verily chastised. "You are copies," he muttered, obstinately, seemingly only to himself. "Just copies."

"I don't really know what's going on here," 'Ianto' declared. "But know that I'm not angry at you, Kurapica. I don't… want to be angry with you. In fact I should… well, you can say I should be overjoyed to know that you survived." There it was: a relief in the man's voice.

"Darling—" his mother's clone began. She was making her way to her feet. Kurapica coiled backwards at the movement, and winced with what she called him; it must have shown on his face, so the woman's expression was immediately apologetic for using a term of endearment. He knew it bewildered her, because his mother had sometimes called him that. Her eyes flickered, and she sat herself down again. An obdurate silence followed; only the low hum of the facility's airconditioning filled the premises.

"So," the man suddenly spoke, as if to clear his throat; his eyes had gone back to their grey hue, but it was apparent that there was a certain restlessness in his movements. "All of this has been possible because we were brought to the outside world."

"Ianto," 'Sianni' began. "Our village has been destroyed, after all." The man responded with a look that was far from condoning. He regarded the youth once more. "Kurapica," he said in his gently voice, only slightly severe, "You mentioned that there were forty more of us who have been retrieved?'"

"That's right," Kurapica replied. He was determined to keep his gaze steady this time. His eyes remained scarlet.

"Where are they?" he inquired. When he looked at his mother's clone—his mother's?—face, he knew that she had the same question.

"In a reservatory. About a floor down."

"May we see them?" came his fathers's clone—his father's—voice again.

"It's really not for me to say," Kurapica replied, but he knew that he merely feigned helplessness. He didn't know yet the full extent of his control on the experiment.

"Then whose say is it?" Ianto asked.

Kurapica found it easier to reply. "A man named Dr. Tournay."

"Ah, him." Ianto recognized the man as one of the scientists who 'helped him get settled down.'

"Then I want to see this Dr. Tournay once more, Kurapica," Ianto announced. "Let's all get to the bottom of this."

* * *

**A/N: **Togashi has never given names to Kurapica's parents so far, so I took the liberty of naming them. ^^ "Ianto" and "Sianni" are Welsh names, both meaning "God is gracious" (although I spelled "Sianni" here with two n's). I'm not entirely sure where Togashi picks his Kuratan names, so I simply made my own system. xD

I think we're nearing the height of the story, so send in the feedback! :D Even if I have a semi-plot in mind, I can always alter things up a bit based on feedback. ;) Again, thanks for those who have reviewed and commented on my fic so far! ^^

Cheers!

Dw-chan :3


	7. Seven: Phase Two

***HxH Disclaimer***

**Author's Notes:** Well, I'm back! And I'm quite over the moon with the bunch of reviews that I've been getting! :D It's quite surprising given the remark that I said last chapter about my own fic. xD But I'm not complaining! Thanks to Bai-Feng, guest reader, complicatedmind21, ShenEna, Florallover, and LordoftheWest for your feedback. They warm the heart. ^o^

Again, don't hesitate to give feedback! :D I appreciate the support. ^^ Here be the seventh chapter. ^^

* * *

Living Things  
By: DW-chan

_**Seven: Phase Two**_

Slightly bemused, Zan Tournay turned to the Kurata man in front of him. "Well, that was quite the family reunion. Took all of two hours." His tried to sound pleasant.

"We have agreed that this is a priority," replied Ianto firmly. Kurapica and Sianni were closely behind, respectfully giving Ianto the reigns. Kurapica glanced at his father's clone—no, his _father_—with a renewed sense of vigor. He had missed his father's way of governing a situation, as the man had always retreated to his quiet, gentle ways.

"I see that your memories have lucratively integrated into your system," said Tournay, visibly gratified. "I'm now more than inclined to address you as—let's see—" Tournay glanced at his tablet. "Ah, so I am graced by the good presence of Ianto and Sianni." His toothy smile showed itself again.

"Zan, I don't see why they can't have a look at the rest of their clanspeople," Barrow interjected himself gracefully enough into the conversation. He nodded to the Kuratans; he rested a gentle gaze on Kurapica.

"Yes, yes, Francis. You've been pestering me about their rights," Zan affably waved a hand at him once. "Every living being has their rights, yes?" Without skipping a beat, the older scientist turned to Ianto; the latter seemed to waver a bit, but quickly regained his composure.

Kurapica saw how much his father was trying his best to brave the situation. He and his mother, after all, were in an unfamiliar place, in a world they had only conceived in hushed talk and dubious voices, with unfamiliar people, among sights which they were seeing for the very first time. His mother had her hand slightly above her belly again, showing in that gesture that she was worried while her face remained placid.

"Well then, follow me," Tournay said, rather jovially. He nodded to Barrow, but the latter waited for the family to advance before he walked after them. Ryger, and then Dr. Meeks—the only female scientist in the team—followed a distance behind. There was something quite robotic about their movements; the only sign that showed that they were human was that they were slightly cautious. They seemed, as always, to be following a certain protocol.

They stepped once again in the large viewing room, with its high ceiling and its softly lit tungsten lamps. However, the reservatory below had already been lit, and there, in forty arrayed silver-and-clear capsules, were the sleeping Kurata clones.

Kurapica felt softness grip at one of his hands. He saw that it was his mother; she had taken his hand in reflex. The calm had washed away from Sianni's face. "Ianto, there they are—" her voice was hoarse.

Ianto was taking deep, meditative breaths, as if he himself was mustering a level of calm. He turned to neither of the scientists that were in the room when he said, "Are they well?"

"Indeed, well as well can be! As we've told Kurapica, they are merely sleeping, that's all."

"When will you wake them?" inquired the Kurata man, his voice overwrought.

"Eventually, we will wake everyone," stated Tournay. "We go through the Project phase by phase, young man."

Ianto's face indicated that he wasn't sure if he agreed with Tournay's way of calling him, much as Kurapica was less partial of being called "my boy."

"This so-called Project," Ianto continued. It was then when he turned to the white-gowned men and woman before him. "You do know what you are doing?"

"Certainly!"

Ianto, somehow, did not appear convinced. Kurapica could see a strange light in his father's eyes. They had retained their sharp, grey hue, but it was if his father was looking into the face of each and every sleeping Kurata in their capsules, clearly remembering their faces. On the other hand, his mother never ceased her grip on his hand.

It was then when Kurapica felt a sense of uneasiness. He had always kept his Nen chains on his right hand. For his mother to clasp her hand around where the familiar feel of chains had always been brought him a gnawing sense of discord.

_Judgment Chain_, came the unbidden thought. His parents knew nothing of his vow.

Ianto seemed pensive for a while, crossing his arms, but that didn't last long. After a moment, he turned to the scientists. In a voice that held both displeasure and dark curiosity, he told them, and it resembled more of a command: "You will explain everything."

Tournay was about to speak, but Barrow impeded the other man's initiative with a look of calm request. "Let me, Zan," the younger man said.

Tournay didn't seem to accede at first; a slight tension filled the air as the two scientists held a small battle of wills. Soon, Tournay held his gaze down for a fraction of second in reluctant assent. It was then did the man's smile disappeared, though amusement shone in his eyes. Finally, Tournay nodded.

That was when Kurapica knew that there was more to the Project, and he had not been told everything.

* * *

Francis Barrow beheld the Kurata family before him. He had invited them into a more spacious room, very much like a living room or a lounge some floors up, away from the main laboratory and the reservatory altogether. Faint washes of vanishing daylight seeped through small clear windows from the ceiling, which showed that they were no longer underground. The room had two sofas and two large, cushioned armchairs. Barrow opted to take one of the armchairs; Ianto took the other upon his wife's silent suggestion, so the two men were more or less seeing eye to eye. Sianni took the couch nearest her husband; Kurapica decided not to take a seat at all, and stood behind his mother.

A somber silence filled the atmosphere. Barrow released a breath which he never knew he had been holding for so long.

"So who are you exactly?" Ianto began strenuously. It was still apparent that he was not used to addressing people from outside the Kurata clan.

"I'm Dr. Francis Barrow, as I've introduced myself before. I'm one of the head Biological Technicians. And—" he gave a faint smile, not without humor, "you can also say that I'm Dr. Zan Tournay's conscience."

"Is Dr. Zan Tournay in charge, then?"

"By default, yes. He is a senior scientist and has been in the Institute for more than thirty years."

From the corner of his eye, he could see Kurapica leaning forward every now and then to whisper into his mother's ear, while the woman gave small, worried nods. It seemed that the boy was translating their conversation in common speech to the Kuratan tongue for his mother. Sianni, though, seemed to have a faint knowledge of the common speech as well; she seemed to grasp it soundly enough, back at the viewing room.

Kurapica, on the other hand, appeared to be watching him closely. The boy's bitterness in his regard for him somehow had dissipated, and it almost seemed that the young man was counting on him to tell him and his parents the unadulterated truth about the Project.

"Well then, I'll begin," stated Barrow. He had brought with him something more relatable and less alien to the Kurata man and woman before him—a tattered notebook, which had been one of Dr. Henaro's possessions. He opened it at a marked page, and carefully set it down on the table.

"This belonged to Dr. Sarvi Henaro. He wasn't really a practicing scientist at first. He began as a professional Hunter who dedicated his life unearthing exotic cultures and secret civilizations."

"I… have heard of him," Ianto admitted, which earned a look of surprise from Kurapica, but the boy held his tongue. His father then continued, "But only by name, and not in person. An elder had mentioned him in passing, and it had not been intended for my ears. This Dr. Henaro seemed to be deeply interested in Kuratan affairs."

"That's right," returned Barrow. "Dr. Henaro never really stepped into the Rukuso territory; not once in his life until—" he cleared his throat. "—he had known of your massacre." He noted the uncomfortable silence that came afterward, yet he resumed. "He and Dr. Hiro Farenski recovered as much as they can of Kuratan records in your village which have not been entirely destroyed, and had aided authorities in identifying most of your bodies. That was when we knew most of your names, especially those among you who were pureblooded Kurata." He pointed at a page on the notebook; the family took the liberty of glancing at it.

"Here are your names: one hundred seventeen of the deceased identified, marked in red ink; eleven of the deceased could not be identified. This name, conversely, is in blue ink." He nodded to Kurapica. "Yes, we have known your name and the huge possibility that you survived even before the Project began."

"But… where are our… _real_ bodies now?" This time it was Sianni who voiced the disquiet within her. She had tried her best not to make it sound too otherworldly a fact.

"Dr. Henaro learned of your rites about cremating your dead. He tried to follow that through as best as he could…"

"How did he come by of our eyes, then?" Ianto's question.

"Professional Hunters have their ways," Barrow replied. "Before forty-two pairs of eyes made their way to the Black Market—"

Something like a curse escaped Ianto's lips. Sianni was grim and silent. It dawned to them that their Scarlet Eyes did fetch a handsome price in the least savory of places.

"—It took Dr. Henaro all of four months to retrieve forty-two pairs of Scarlet Eyes. He did not go into detail; it was information classified only to him. We did know that… the thieves who had first gone for your Scarlet Eyes no longer took interest in them." The mention of _thieves_ incited a reaction from Kurapica, and Barrow guessed that it was subdued enough not to get his parents' attention.

Nevertheless, Barrow went on. "Dr. Henaro had not first intended to study your Scarlet Eyes as scientific specimens, but eventually, he did. While he never did begin as a scientist and was foremost a Hunter, he did receive a degree in Advanced Bio-engineering, much like my own field, and that was when he began to study the Eyes in earnest." Barrow turned the notebook to another marked page.

"Your bodies had long expired, but your Eyes continued to live. The optic cells housed nuclei which are very unique—and perhaps you are the only ones on this known world who had those cells, which were heavily concentrated solely on your Scarlet Eyes. But that was as far as Dr. Henaro's studies went. A team of eighteen scientists and doctors was formed: surgeons, genetic engineers, neurologists. We had carried on the Project ever since."

"You keep on saying 'Project.' Did it ever have a name?" This was Kurapica's question. Barrow was relieved that the boy held no hostility. He asked out of want for knowledge.

"Yes, it had. But it was dropped soon after; the name was too revealing and, well, if not a bit too cliché..."

"What was it, then?"

"Project Lazarus."

"Playing God..." It was Kurapica's low voice, and it trailed off, as if reminding him of what they had conversed about not too long ago. The boy's eyes met his. They were slightly narrowed, but it was not something which Barrow had not encountered before.

"Kurapica, everything that had transpired so far—the cloning, proving our theories on memory—that was only Phase One."

"We won't be here if you were not to tell us more," was Kurapica's flat reply.

Barrow nodded. "Phase Two should commence in about two years, when every Kurata… clone…" he was careful to mention the word, now that Ianto's and Sianni's clones had fully regained their memories. "…has been awakened."

"And what after that?"

There was a thoughtful pause before Barrow decided to declare it.

"Relocation to Rukuso."

There was sheer incredulousness in—this time—Ianto's voice. "You meant to return all of us to our homeland as part of your Project?"

"Yes."

"And for what?"

Barrow tried as hard as he can to cast all pretentions away. To hell to what Tournay might think. Barrow was addressing people who had a prodigious ability to think, analyze, and _feel_. "Preservation and further study."

"Like objects under a microscope," Kurapica stated tersely.

"—And protection," Barrow added. "Kurapica, I know what your misgivings are about the Project. They had been my misgivings once. I can't deny that this is an opportunity for your people to live again, only this time, with fortification from what you call 'the outside world.'"

"It was the discrimination from the 'outside world' which was the foremost reason why we had kept ourselves hidden and secret," Ianto explained. "We still have little love for the outside world, even though you think you can sway us with supposed good intentions."

"Well, you can say what you want," Sianni proclaimed. "But with you involved, life will never be the same."

Ianto was nodding. Kurapica, however, remained silent, but a brooding shadow, as it always had, loomed over the youth.

"You may have brought us back to life," continued Ianto, "but does that mean you now _own_ us?"

"That is a very good point, Ianto," Barrow said with as much sincerity he can muster. _Damage control_, his own mantra echoed. _Damage control_. "I, among seven other members of the team, voted for your autonomy. However, that means that eleven other members outvoted us. But the results aren't final. They can change, they can always change…" Barrow faltered for a moment. "But we're getting ahead of ourselves. Phase One has barely concluded."

That was when Ianto stood up. The expression on his face was dark, and eclipsed with distaste. Without any word to his wife and son, he made his way out of the room. Sianni and Kurapica followed his retreating form with their eyes, but made no attempt to stop him.

"I'm afraid, Dr. Barrow," Kurapica said simply, "That Phase Two has to wait a little longer."

Barrow did not argue with the incisive young man. "Yes," he assented, not knowing where to really direct his gaze, so he kept them on the tattered remains of Dr. Henaro's notebook. "Yes, I agree."

* * *

Sianni followed Ianto not long afterwards, but not without tender regard for her son, whom she quietly asked momentary leave from. Kurapica remained; the boy took the liberty of taking his father's place on the cushioned armchair that was right across Barrow's, with only the rectangular glass table as the barrier between them.

"Kurapica," Barrow finally said. That was only then when he slumped his elbows against his knees as he sat, folding his hands in front of him. "Transparency is never easy."

_Zan Tournay's conscience_, he remembered hearing himself say. He had never really thought himself as conscience to only Zan Tournay. Perhaps he was fighting a little too hard in being Project Lazarus' conscience in its entirety. Yes, he had contributed much to the Project's continuation, if not part of its conception, and he had utilized all he knew about his field into the Project, knowing that when the time comes—_if_ the time comes—the Institution would let him retire peacefully until the end of his days. He had thought that he was part of something bigger than himself, despite his personal diatribe towards most aspects of the Project. He may be a smidgen of conscience to how the Project planned to treat the clones. In turn, however, who would be _his_ conscience? He thought that he could never be as objective as Tournay in his regard to Project Lazarus, until he realized that for the past few days, he had been dealing with human emotion more than ever did in his lifetime.

And strangely, from a family comprised of a sole survivor and his genetic replicate parents.

"Was that all the truth you could tell us?" The youth's voice snapped Barrow from his thoughts. He addressed the boy.

"I'm afraid that's all I know about the Project," Barrow confessed.

"And I'm afraid that I have to disagree with that, Dr. Barrow," was Kurapica's keen rejoinder.

Barrow was genuinely intrigued. "What makes you perceive so much, Kurapica?"

"I read it in your eyes, doctor," replied the boy.

"Well, you can say that what I've revealed to you is what I know about the Project concerning you and your people," said Barrow. "But if you mean revealing about what might happen to the team…"

"It's not like I didn't see how you've kept everything clandestine all this time. At least, I can hand that to you," admitted the young man.

Barrow smiled. "We're guarding the Project with our lives, Kurapica. More than you know—"

"Then tell me."

"I think you've already figured out the reason why you have even found us at all, was because we actually let you find us."

"Yes, that much I now know," said Kurapica.

Barrow nodded. "However, should the Project been found out by anyone else other than you, this could not have only been the end of the Project."

The boy was quiet, but his uncloaked eyes revealed icy commiseration—and this oxymoron was only possible through Kurapica's near-stoicism.

"This could have been the end of the team. And I don't mean simply being fired."

"It's being... executed," Kurapica disclosed what he himself had unveiled.

"The Project dies, and we die with it," Barrow confirmed. He surprised himself with how he was relaying this so coolly, as though he were merely picking out what to eat for lunch, or changing the batteries of his phone.

"Who decided this for you?"

"Why, Kurapica; are you finally offering the sympathy which you've wanted so much not to give?" was Barrow's jesting retort, but by all means was he not making fun of the boy.

"This was something I had sensed before, but it never really came to me," Kurapica said slowly, "that the reason I allowed myself to participate in your experiment was because you had staked your lives in it."

"We stake our lives for what we believe in, do we not?" Barrow was not really partial to rhetoric, but there was something about the youth which made him spurt such drivel… at least, that's what Barrow thought it was. He wasn't exactly sure if it made the clearest sense to Kurapica.

The boy, however, made no signs of acknowledging his so-called drivel. Instead, Kurapica intoned after a while, "There will be forty-three of us should you wake everyone up, and not everyone will understand, even if you explain all this over and over again."

Barrow found himself nodding slowly, nearly absently, unconsciously agreeing to the boy whole-heartedly. "Yes, Kurapica. This is the finest, most organized mess we've placed ourselves in." He gave the boy a humorless smile.

"And I wish I could say 'good luck' with all my heart," said the young man. Barrow attempted to find some traces of sarcasm in what the boy said, but from how he saw the boy's face, he realized that there was none.

Kurapica stood up and turned to leave. He was making his way out the door when he paused to look back.

"And Dr. Barrow?" called the youth.

"Yes?"

"For what we believe in," he began, and from Barrow's vantage point he caught the boy glancing down at his own folded right hand. "Yes, we do stake our lives."

Before Barrow could speak or react, the door had already slid shut behind the boy.

* * *

**A/N**: I'm not sure if this chapter was even remotely exciting enough to be worth the nearly week-long wait. ^^;; It's actually more backgrounders and "foundation stories." Then again, let me know! :D

And yes, "Project Lazarus" is a corny name. That's why I myself had to scrap it out… partially. Ehehehe.

I may have to extend this fanfic to about two more chapters than the conceptualized ten. We shall seeeeee-

Send the reviews, comments, chocolate cake, and rum sodas my way! xDD

Cheers!

DW-chan :3


	8. Eight: Cleave

***HxH Disclaimer***

**Author's Notes:** Well, took me a while to return to this one! :3 Apologies about that, dear readers. ^^;; Story ADHD is both fun and cumbersome at the same time. Continuity and consistency can be a bit of a mess afterwards but hey, I've got you to point them out for me through critiques and comments. ;) So, fire away! ^^

Here's chapter 8—finally! ^^

* * *

Living Things  
By: DW-chan

_**Eight: Cleave**_

Ianto stood there, his gaze abstractly penetrating the wide glass window of a reception hall, which was silent and empty. His hands were knotted behind him; he wore a mask of pensiveness.

A semblance of greenery and a small fountain—the only other signs of life in the metal and iron-gilded facility lit up the monotonous, sterile design of the place. The sun had not quite set yet; vestiges of a clear blue sky, the sun not still in its later afternoon yellow graced the hall, casting Ianto's shadow like a pillar across the dull blue carpeted floor. Outside was a vast, endless wash of golden-brown dunes; it appeared that they were in a middle of a dessert of some sort, which only proved how isolated the facility was.

Almost involuntarily, Ianto unclasped his fingers from behind his back and held them before his eyes. He turned them over, as though he were seeing his hands for the first time.

_New life, new body, new skin_, he thought. He remembered having small scars from gashes he acquired as a young man as he worked through long days back in the Kurata village. They scars were not there—only the fine lines and patterns on the palms of human hands.

He heard a hiss behind him as a door slid open, and he turned to find his wife, Sianni, walk towards him, her expression concerned, her eyes thoughtful. She silently made her way towards him, until she stood beside him, and she laced her arm around his; she then placed her golden-haired head on his shoulder.

"Five years," said Ianto after a short quietness, speaking as though they were returning to a conversation they had left not long ago.

"We weren't there for him for five years," assented Sianni in understanding; in the years of their marriage during their old lives, they had somehow learned to finish each other's sentences, and only very slightly read each other's minds.

"Did you sense anything different from him, Sianni?" inquired Ianto, turning to the golden head upon his shoulder.

"Of course," she replied, almost immediately. "He's all grown up, isn't he? My little child." She lifted her head to meet Ianto's eyes. "He could've learned a lot from you. If nothing of this happened, and were still all alive five years ago in Rukuso, he would've been a man after his father…"

Ianto smiled. "Kurapica is more like you, Sianni. Strong-willed, strong-minded…"

"And he is also like you, dear," Sianni returned. "Intelligent, with a noble heart…"

"And that's why I married you," remarked Ianto in jest. Sianni gave him a funny look, knowing her words were boosting her husband's ego; she smiled, and laid her head on his shoulder once more.

Another hiss was heard as the door slid open once again. They both turned to see Kurapica emerge from the door; he stopped midway at the hall when he beheld both his parents, two shadowed figures against the wide glass window where the setting sun reflected upon it.

The youth appeared to be distracted with a faraway thought in his mind. His blue eyes flickered between his parents and the room around him, down the carpet and back to his parents once more. He seemed to be battling something within him.

Ianto and Sianni parted their embrace for a moment to turn their undivided attention towards their son.

"Kurapica, what is it, darling?" Sianni's soft voice echoed throughout the hall.

The boy's clear eyes regarded his parents for a moment, the longest time which he kept his gaze steady since he entered the hall. Kurapica opened his mouth for a moment, trying to speak but couldn't bring the words out of his mouth. Like a fool, he stood there, dumbfounded.

It was Sianni who came to him, took hold of his hands, and led him to where she and Ianto stood. When Kurapica finally looked up and into her blue-grey eyes, Sianni then placed her hands at either side of her son's face, but her fingers only barely touched his skin; a certain air that mixed unfamiliarity and familiarity swirled between parents and child. Now that they were finally alone once more, they had the time to themselves, but the feelings of ambivalence lingered.

"Kurapica," Sianni said slowly. "I know that this is hard for you, darling. But… this is hard for us, too."

Kurapica then nodded, eyes cast downwards for a moment before his own hands tenderly grasped his mother's hands. "I know, mother," he acknowledged her. A light glowed in Sianni's eyes when the boy finally addressed her the way she wished he would. The young man smiled.

"Father—" began the boy, searching for Ianto; Ianto was there, not far from where mother and son stood, and the man nodded, his gaze softening and gladdened.

"My son," said Ianto; lodestone had been lifted off his chest.

Kurapica seemed to flinch a little at Sianni's touch, and out of reflex, the woman lowered her hands, knowing that the ambivalence remained. It won't go away that quickly; it had only been a little over a day since they first saw each other again, alive, well, and whole, in bodies reconstructed for their souls.

"You never chose for any of this to happen," said Kurapica, trying as hard as he can to focus on the faces of his mother and father. "These people decided things for you. And they will continue to decide for you."

Ianto then took the initiative to motion his wife and son to the grey cushioned chairs that surrounded a sleek metal table. The sun barely peaked through the dunes outside, and the facility lights began to glow ever brighter.

"They seem to know what they're doing," Ianto mused, his voice carrying the expression as well. "They know that if they awakened us in larger groups, there will be unrest, and they will have less control." Ianto sighed. "We _are_ under their jurisdiction. Yes, we didn't choose this for us, but…" He was silent afterwards, as if he were searching for the right words.

"If it means seeing you again…" finished Sianni, reaching out for her son. However, the boy only seemed to half-heartedly clasp his mother's hand in return. He appeared to be distracted once more.

"I don't think I'll ever understand this outside world," admitted Ianto, almost coldly. "I don't think I ever want to."

"How did you ever manage for five years in the outside world, darling?" Sianni inquired of her son, letting her husband brood for a moment. It was apparent in her voice, and with how often she asserted it, that she sorely missed addressing her son with endearment. "And… without… _us_?"

"I…" they boy started; he paused. Barely visible, and with the tiniest movements, he shook his head. Long moments passed before he finally spoke again. "You were _dead_."

"Kurapica…" Sianni had tried to grip his hands; the youth's hands had grown cold, his fingers frozen in place.

"You were murdered, and I…" A breath escaped the young man. He pushed to continue. "I wanted… _to avenge you_."

There was little ceremony in how the boy disclosed it, but his frame was rigid, and he seemed to fighting an inner war. Ianto shifted from where he sat; the man grew more intent towards his son. Something unspoken seemed to pass from between father and son, and the mother can only watch from the sidelines, unwillingly.

It was Sianni, then, who found her voice. "What happened?" It was but a whisper, but emotion began to leak from her, like tiny silver pins.

Kurapica's eyes closed for a moment, still battling something within himself. When they finally opened, his eyes were a bright crimson; Ianto and Sianni drew slightly back, wondering what had impelled such strong reaction from their son. Kurapica lifted his right hand, and a film of pulsating energy coated it for a moment before chains, wrapping each finger like a glove, materialized, until it was solid and unmistakably real.

"What are…" Sianni trailed off.

"Nen…" his father finally said, his low, gentle voice cracking. "You've learned it."

Sianni turned to Ianto. "Nen?" she said sharply. They seem to have a good inkling of what it was, but Sianni was more at loss. She looked to her husband for answers, and to her son for clarification. She looked for both from the two of them.

"I became a Hunter," Kurapica spoke; he was struggling to keep his voice steady. "And learned how to materialize these chains from my life force, from my Nen."

Sianni looked at him as though her heart was beginning to break. Ianto looked briefly dazed, as though he were lightly punched in the chest.

"These chains," continued Kurapica, fighting for the surety in him, "were created under certain conditions." He raised his hand higher, and with his left hand, he revealed the end of each chain from each finger, one by one. Kurapica was watching his parents' facial expressions. They seemed to be controlling whatever turmoil they had in their hearts well, as their eyes had not turned into their scarlet hue yet, but he knew that they would, eventually, before he was done…

_Holy Chain._

_Dowsing Chain._

_Chain Jail._

_Judgment Chain._

He explained each of the chains like a machine on autopilot, and he barely recognized his own voice. He went on, as though he were simply in school reciting a lesson back to a teacher; he was barely finished with _Judgment Chain_ when he felt strong hands grip at his own.

Bewildered, Kurapica addressed the man before him as though he were seeing Ianto for the first time, and that he was merely waking up from a trance. He knew his eyes had returned to their glassy cerulean, and his chains vanished like thin fog. He felt like floating, but the sure grip of his father's hands kept his wavering resolve in place.

"Those were the old ways," Ianto managed to get through to his son, his voice taut but unyielding. "Kurapica, listen to me, vengeance, bloodshed, death for death… Kurapica, our ancestors have done that, it was only our ancestors…"

"Then their ways have taught me well," Kurapica was surprised with his own answer. Ianto briskly shook his head. Tendrils of red were beginning to form in his father's eyes. Kurapica couldn't bear to look at his mother, so he kept his eyes fixed on Ianto and his eyes that slowly spurted their crimson light.

"Our murderers will be brought to justice, they will have their days," Ianto insisted firmly, now gripping at his son's shoulders. The man had stood and was now kneeling in front of his son, who remained seated. Ianto was a tall man, so he only slightly bent his face upward so he could meet Kurapica in the eye. "But to risk your life in this way, to bring purpose to your survival this way…"

"It was all I could ever think of," Kurapica said, only audible enough for his father to hear.

"Kurapica…" Ianto now felt helpless.

"I was the _last_, father. There was…"

_Nothing to lose_, Kurapica finished in his mind. Now, saying it at that very moment, Kurapica only felt a certain numbness, even a certain foolishness, but he shook both emotions away. He only wanted to feel Ianto's warm grip on his shoulders that somehow refused to shake, even though he wanted them to.

"If you love us…" it was Sianni this time, and forcibly, Kurapica looked up to face her; she was still frozen where she sat, barely across him, close enough to hold him, and yet she kept her hands on her lap; her hands were in a death-grip against each other that her fingers lost all their color. "If you love us, Kurapica, you will take that wretched Nen sword off your heart!" Her eyes were ablaze. There were tears, and they fell like crystal down her cheeks and her quivering chin. "If you love us, you will…" she had looked away, and she placed her arms around herself, as though to comfort herself or shield herself from the ugliness of reality.

"I did it because I love you," Kurapica said, the coldness from his hands crawling up to the rest of his body. "And it was all I could think about, and no one could stop me…"

"Can we stop you?" Ianto called to his son again, and when Kurapica did not reply, Ianto shook his son gently, pleadingly. "Kurapica, can _we _stop you?"

Kurapica couldn't meet his father's eyes. He seemed to be in a trance again and then he whispered, "It's too late."

"Too late? What do you mean?" Ianto's voice was now desperate.

"I've killed, father. Two of the murderers are dead because I killed them." The words flowed through Kurapica like a clarion call. He knew his mother heard it was well.

"It's _not_ too late!" Sianni cried out. She had unfurled her arms from herself and stood up, but she was immobilized; she couldn't will herself to come closer to her son, even as he say a few feet away from her. "You can stop now, you could always stop now, and that would be it, that would be over. We're here now," and that was when she came to him; Ianto gave way to his wife as she bade her turn to hold her son's hands, clasping them together as though in prayer. "We're here now, we're together, and that's all that matters, right?"

Kurapica couldn't even feel his eyes returning to their scarlet. Only a wash of bafflement overcame him, but he acknowledged his mother's grip, and held her hands in return.

"I know you did it because it would honor the dead, as in the old ways," Sianni voiced out. "I know you did it because you loved us, but this can't continue, my son, my darling." She placed both his hands to her lips. They were wet from tears. "This revenge will have to stop, do you hear me? Listen to me, listen to your father. Please, this has to stop."

As though he was barely listening, like a doll with glazed eyes—the only sign of emotion on him were his knitted brows, Kurapica asked, "Do you forgive them?"

Sianni blinked, herself confused. "Who?"

Kurapica looked at his mother. "Your murderers."

"Darling…"

"We saw their faces. We saw how they managed to wipe us out, one by one," Ianto spoke. "We saw how they tortured the elders and the children."

Kurapica's brows knitted further. What was his father trying to say by inciting a rage in him?

Ianto stepped forward. "It would be easy to decide what you have decided for yourself when you must have learned of our deaths. You're in a room, with four walls, and one door, only one door. You only saw one door at that time, and you took it."

Sianni looked up at her husband; her tears no longer flowed but they had stained her face. Her eyes were clear from the crimson now. She slowly stood up, letting go of Kurapica's hands for a moment. Ianto took one of Kurapica's arms, and gently lifted the boy to his feet.

"If I had been where you were, I would have taken that door, too. It is easy, yet never easy." He spoke to Kurapica with a voice a little above a whisper. "You only did what you knew what was right." Then, like an encompassing force, he pulled his son into an embrace. "In the end, we must forgive. In the end, we must live. That's the highest honor we can give to those who have passed on."

"Father…" Kurapica gripped at his father's arms; was he worthy of such strong, unbending affection?

Ianto had placed a hand on Kurapica's head, as if in blessing. "Release your anger when you're ready. Forgive when you are ready, but remember to _live_."

Kurapica closed his eyes, finally yielding to his father's embrace. He wanted the tears to fall; everything in his being wanted to shed those tears, but they didn't fall. Had he lost the ability to cry? Yet he knew if he could, he would be crying now, and the world would just wither away into nothing save for the patch of earth where he, his father, and his mother stood.

The clones were gone, the copies have all but disappeared. This was Ianto, his father; Sianni, his mother—and he had finally cleaved with them as Kurapica, their son.

* * *

Barrow was in his office, and the office was dark save for a desk lamp set on his table. It lit one solitary object on the table: a tiny voice recorder, black and glistening like a long insect. A green light flickered upon it as the recorder waited to be played. Barrow stared at it for a moment, pondering whether to turn it on or if he should stow it away once more. It had been a long day; he should be going straight to his quarters soon.

Barrow sighed, lifted a finger, and turned on the recorder. The sound of a man's voice emanated from the tiny device: it had traces of a foreign accent, but it was a robust kind of voice which belonged to a man of an opposite stature. The voice belonged to Dr. Sarvi Henaro. Barrow absently tapped a pen on his desk as he listened to the drawl.

_This is Dr. Sarvi Henaro, of the Mendora-Jonston Institute. I'm a Professional Hunter, but also a scientist. I've decided to lay aside being a Hunter for a while to focus and care for a huge discovery. I can't say that this will impact all of mankind, but this will definitely change our approach to cloning._

_Now cloning is by far the most delicate subject I've come across in the years of both my profession. I've visited cultures that conducted human sacrifice and practiced fratricide to obtain succession, and visited indigenous peoples that maim their fellow tribesman as punishment for petty crimes. Cloning, however, is a different kind of monster. It was only to my surprise and pleasant shock that the Institute had issued grants and their express and legal permission to begin the cloning process. _

_Needless to say, it was a fragile experiment. Cloning has been done before but to no success, as I have noted in older recordings of other renowned bio-engineers. It's no secret that I have shown much interest to a clan in the Rukuso region called the Kurata, who kept their existence hidden for years, and who also controlled their population extensively to make moving around much easier, should the need arise. It is most unfortunate that the clan has been slain and I very much am at loss emotionally, as well as in my direction of my work on them. The reason for their demise had been the forceful acquittal of their eyes, also known as the Scarlet Eyes. _

Dr. Henaro's voice droned on, expressively—a man impassioned about his work. After ten more minutes of talking, Barrow took note of the beginning of Henaro's last few sentences in the recording:

_The Scarlet Eyes are the key. The survivor is the key._

_We know that_, Barrow mused, but he simply wanted to hear the man's voice, anyway. He pressed the track forward to a section he thought he needed to listen to again.

_When they wake, they will be confused. But they are, nevertheless, human beings, those not born from a mother's womb, and while they were formed by machine, they are still made up of living cells. With or without past memories, they will still form new ones, and would express and absorb emotion._

_Treat them well. They are your children, as they have been mine. _

_However, in the event that something goes wrong—_

"Francis, still up at this hour?" Barrow started, turned off the recorded hastily, and turned to the intruder. At first he thought it was Tournay as the rascal seldom knocked to herald his approach, but then he realized that it was Ryger instead. The small doctor was wide-eyed.

"I'm sorry to have startled you," apologized Ryger. "I was knocking and I guess you didn't hear me."

Barrow ran a hand over his face. "No, no, it's nothing." He slid the recorder back to one of his vaulted drawers which opened at his thumbprint. "Just running some notes, that's all. I know I wouldn't be able to sleep again tonight, anyway."

Ryger nodded. "I thought I didn't have time to tell you today until I found you in your office. While you were conversing with the Kurata family, we had come to an arrangement to postpone waking up the rest of the clones until further notice."

Barrow sat up straight. "Is there any particular reason why? I mean—I'm not against it, I think that's wise but—did Zan mention—"

"Well, Tournay did mention that you would concur to the decision, but," Ryger blinked rapidly, as though in confusion himself. "He didn't mention why. At least for now. You know how Zan works." The doctor gave Barrow a small smile.

"I know full well how that bastard works," Barrow smiled back and nodded. "Well, he can explain tomorrow. I only hope he does." He shook his head dismissively.

"Oh, was that Dr. Henaro's recording you were listening to, if I may ask?" Ryger intoned, rather sheepishly.

"Why, yes, if you must know."

"He's a funny one, isn't he? Just disappearing off like that, and only leaving us with his materials, recordings, a lab, and all the equipment we need," remarked Ryger contemplatively, but genuinely into a conversation. "Have you ever met the fellow?"

"Once," Barrow stated. "He's not a very public man."

"I just hope he's alive and well, despite his illness."

Barrow acknowledged Ryger with a stiff, almost automatic kind of nod. "Of course, Josef. I'm sure he's out there somewhere."

"Well, goodnight then, Francis."

Barrow picked his white laboratory gown from the back of his chair, preparing to leave as well.

"Right. Goodnight, Josef. I'll see you in the morning."

* * *

**A/N: **I hope that the first bit of this chapter wasn't too melodramatic for ye folks! ^^;; I think for some of you that was one of the most awaited parts of this story, so I hope I did it some justice. ^^

As always, and by the power of your kind hearts, don't forget to review, comment, leave a note or two, etc. xD

Cheers!

DW-chan :3


	9. Nine: The Project, Reprise

***HxH Disclaimer***

**Author's Notes:** My updates are growing a week apart. Dx My apologies, folks! Had some school papers to finish. Now that I can get them out of my mind, I can focus on my fics again. Goodie! :3

Once again, I'd like to thank those who have reviewed my last chapter: Bai-Feng, a guest reader, Olhana, Raywolf Shibelt, LorfoftheWest, Kiniro-chan, and Faith Yoite! :D I'm so glad and appreciative that you've followed through my story and kept the reviews coming. ^^ I've PM'ed you my thanks. ;)

Some of you wanted to see more interaction between Kurapica and his parents, so here. This chapter will be a bit light-hearted, for a change. ^^

* * *

Living Things  
By: DW-chan

_**Nine: The Project, Reprise**_

Sianni saw her husband enter their room—it had been three days since they had woken up into this strange, new world, but acclimatizing hadn't been much of a chore, especially when they were in a limited environment.

However, one day, Ianto had decided to try the outdoors. He seemed ecstatic; for a moment, the weight of their dire situation vanished, and his guard was down, even for a miniscule moment. His eyes were slanted and smiling as he greeted his wife with a tremor of anxiety and excitement in his voice. He was holding a strange contraption in his hands. "Sianni."

Sianni inquired, "What's that, dear?"

"Oh this?" Ianto held the funny-looking device up, nearly absent-mindedly as though Sianni ought to dismiss the matter altogether. "Dr. Barrow was kind enough to have me borrow this. It was for one of the children when they woke up, but I was wondering if Kurapica—"

"Ianto," Sianni mused. "Is that a child's toy?"

Ianto seemed uneasy, but his smile did not fade.

Sianni tried to hide a small break in her voice, and to sound matter-of-factly as in her usual manner. "Kurapica is not a child anymore." She kept her hands together in front of her, on her lap, and she held them together tightly.

Her husband blinked a few times, as though what she said did not really sink into him. "Well, I had promised to take him kite-flying on his thirteenth birthday…" He cleared his throat, seemingly holding the toy protectively in his hands.

"He's seventeen."

"I know."

"He had refused kite-flying. He said he's too old for it at thirteen. What makes you think he'll agree _now_?"

"Sianni—" Ianto seemed flustered at first, unable to quickly decide where to place the toy down, which he eventually did, on a table at the far end of the room. Then he walked to his wife to placate her own worries. He ran his hands down her shoulders. Sianni, on the other hand, had her gaze flutter around the room, not knowing really where to look.

"Five years… the massacre…" Ianto said brokenly, but his voice was calm and gentle, and Sianni just wanted to drown in the comfort of it. When she still refused to steady her gaze at him, Ianto soothingly held her chin, so she finally had the chance to look into his eyes. "It took us away from our little boy. It took our little boy away from _us_. Don't you feel the same as I do?" He smiled his small yet open smile.

"He grew up too fast, even at twelve," Sianni admitted. "He knew what he wanted for himself. He was making his own decisions, like a little adult…"

"Sianni," Ianto continued to persuade his wife good-naturedly. "There's a father in me who'd want to play with his little boy. Don't you think there's a little boy still in our son who'd want to play with his old man?" A ghost of a grin was on the man's face.

Sianni knew that anything she would say about their son maturing earlier than most children would not dissuade Ianto. She shook her head, smiled, and cupped her husband's face. "Fine. Do what you want. But don't go crying back to me if Kurapica refuses your offer."

Almost like a little boy himself, Ianto's eyes brightened; he kissed his wife on the forehead before retrieving the toy, and heading back to the hallway to their son's room. There was a semblance of a home in this cavernous, iron-and-steel hideaway of a laboratory facility, now that they were together.

Sianni continued to hold her hands together. She thought for a while, but then she straightened her Kurata garb and managed to walk out of the door to follow her husband. Something in her knew that Kurapica would agree after all, and she wanted to see them, father and son, like old times, like the good old times.

* * *

"It's remote control."

Ianto looked happily perplexed. "What, son?"

"Father, these are the controls which you work with so the little airship will fly." Kurapica took the small, sleek panel from Ianto's grasp. "Here." The boy, then, proceeded to demonstrate.

The tiny shell-colored airship which Ianto had settled on the fine stretch of sand before them began to vibrate, move, and then take off, little by little. Wisps of fine, golden-brown grains swept in all directions as the little toy made its ascent to the fine-weathered desert sky. It hovered there, like a bubble, and when Kurapica's fingers deftly danced on the panel, the airship maneuvered gracefully.

"I don't really understand these outside world things, Kurapica. I wish they had kites here instead," Ianto remarked, but he did not sound disappointed. His voice reverberated a curious joy. He looked at his son. The boy seemed engrossed—and a little too serious—in making sure that the tiny airship didn't crash.

Ianto wanted to shake the austerity off his son's demeanor. He approached the youth. "It's father's turn?"

Kurapica took a minute to make sure that the airship had landed back on the sand before handing it over to Ianto. The boy looked a bit unsure, but Ianto seemed like the eager child in the stead of his young son. Kurapica proferred his father a quick lecture on controls, and Ianto tried as much as he can to absorb the foreign nature of the instructions. He nodded almost every time Kurapica punctuated with an, "all right?" or "Do you understand, father?"

"I got this, son."

The airship teetered a little, like a dancer awkwardly regaining balance from a fall, like a baby learning its first steps. Ianto's fingers entangled themselves unto each other soon afterwards, and then he gingerly laughed.

"You crashed the airship, father." Kurapica turned to Ianto, his lips curled, his eyebrows askew.

Ianto grinned. "It's not broken, is it?"

Kurapica ran to rescue the hapless toy. He returned, turning the device over. "I think these things were made to fall. It's built for ten-year-olds." He tapped at the airship's material. "It's nowhere modeled like an actual airship with its delicate parts, and it's sturdy."

"Analyzing again, are we?" Ianto chuckled. He reached out and placed a hand on his son's head, ruffling the golden hair a little. The youth turned to him.

"I think the kite would have been fun to analyze too," said the boy. A small smile began to form on Kurapica's face. The brittle-like cracks of tiredness in the boy's eyes began to dissipate. It was like a bright gem had been unearthed after long years of being hidden away, to the point of forever.

Ianto could barely contain himself, and he drew his son close, in a one-armed bear hug, locking the boy's head between limb and chest. Kurapica protested with an uncharacteristic squawk, and he struggled a little. Ianto knew that Kurapica had grown even more physically stronger through the years, despite his slight frame, and that the boy was merely feigning feebleness.

"Father, stop it, you'll ruin the airship—" It was still in Kurapica's grasp, and the boy had always been meticulous about many things.

"Set it down, then," Ianto ordered with a grin, and Kurapica set it down, still in his father's headlock. With that over and done with, Kurapica, to Ianto's clear and utter surprise, retaliated. He tackled his father around the torso and very soon the boy and man were playing a stalemate dance of sorts on the sand, leaving rolling patterns wherever they moved.

Sianni couldn't believe her eyes. Moreover, she couldn't believe her ears.

It was as if it had been years since she saw this sight, and heard, what she veritably knew, was laughter. It emanated from both her husband and son, in equal relish. She stood there, by the side of the door from where man and youth took their exit to the golden expanse a few yards from the facility. Everything glowed and glinted in silver and gold under the later afternoon sun.

Her arms were folded. A smile had formed on her face without her knowing.

Against the huge ball of sunlight, amongst the dunes, were the silhouettes of father and son, romping like two little boys that had been released from a long year at school from a tyrannical teacher.

In which the little airship lay unperturbed in the sand, like a little white face, blinking against the sun.

* * *

The scientists seem to be lying low. Even the persistent Dr. Barrow remained at the sidelines. Apart from letting Ianto borrow the toy airship the day before, he was only offering his usual politeness, like offering Ianto coffee during breakfast the day after, or nodding to Kurapica when the youth glanced at him for too long with a shadowed look.

"No one's waking up after a while, Kurapica," Dr. Barrow said once, but it seemed like he was only speaking to him upon the advice of Tournay. "I've always tried to see to that, but everyone has agreed to hold it out a little longer. I'll let you know what's up when I do; don't worry. You have—"

"—every right to know," finished Kurapica. He seemed to have borne no emotion for Dr. Barrow; now that the scientist placed a tiny barrier between them, Kurapica's guard was partly up. However, there was no forced coldness. It was just simple neutrality.

Dr. Barrow nodded once more, with kind eyes. Before he left, he had said, "Kurapica, I'm glad that you've come to know your family again." There was sincerity in the scientist, even if Kurapica had not pierced his gaze into the man's eyes.

Kurapica found his father once more at the viewing deck of the reservatory in his customary pose: hands folded behind him. A straightforward wistfulness was on the man's face, and there was silence for a moment before Ianto acknowledged Kurapica's presence.

"They're alive, yet so peaceful, aren't they?" Ianto began. He smiled his small smile to his son.

Kurapica walked to his father's side. Ever since he turned a little older than ten, his closeness with his father somewhat waned, very much as it did with some young boys, but Kurapica found himself conversing with Ianto as though a sundering never happened. "Do you think they deserve this?"

Ianto breathed deeply. He turned to the youth. "I've always wanted to know what you think, Kurapica."

Kurapica returned, "I want to know your thoughts this time, father."

Ianto's smile grew wider, his almond-shaped eyes seemingly closing shut in his smile. There was a pause before he said, "The chance was given to us, and it looks like it's out of our hands now. And I don't mean Tournay and the others." He momentarily drew his gaze upwards, it almost seemed like a shrug. "There has always been a greater power out there, Kurapica. You know that, as it is in our custom. It's been watching over you. It's been watching over us."

Kurapica held his gaze down for a moment before turning his gaze to the slumbering clones two floors below them, across the glass. At that moment they didn't seem like caskets. They were simply glass beds, like in a nursery, or a dormitory. Each Kurata face was near-perfect, fully formed, and it was apparent even from where Kurapica and Ianto stood. Forty faces. Forty souls.

"There you are! I was wondering where you were. I'm starting to feel left out of your exclusive gentlemen's club!" Sianni wandered into the room. She was rubbing one of her arms as though a chill had passed through her. She looked out of the viewing deck.

"My sister's not there, looks like it," Sianni reported, a bit sadly.

"Pairo's mother is," Kurapica volunteered. Afterwards, he was not entirely sure why he had remembered Pairo and his parents all of a sudden.

Sianni shook the moroseness from her bright features. "Ah, sweet Eleni. She was my childhood friend just as Pairo was yours, right?" When Kurapica did not reply, Sianni, a little bit nervously, cleared her throat. She glanced up at Ianto, but her husband, as always, gave her his assuring, gentle look.

"Is Pairo among them?" she tentatively asked. She tried to sound cheery, but not overly so; she was unsure with how to lift the small, sudden tension in the room.

Kurapica shook his head. "No, mother."

"Oh." Sianni did not know what else to say. She slowly took a step towards her son, and in an unhelped gesture, lightly and briefly ran a hand through her son's back. She was only relieved that Kurapica had not flinched, or started, just as he had done on the first couple of days since she and Ianto awakened.

"Well," Sianni struggled for words, but only immense emotion would have her utter her innermost feelings. She wished not to be maudlin now, so she only managed a, "Everything's going to be alright, darling. A little faith, you know." She smiled.

Kurapica gently turned to his mother, a small, curious smile on his face. "Mother…!"

"I know, I know, I'm just… sappy."

"Is that why we love her, son?" Ianto had suddenly joined in the conversation, and an instant link clutched between father and son.

"Yes," Kurapica said simply.

Sianni shook her head, suddenly overcome by the joined forces of two men. Out of nowhere, and just to ruffle things up a little, as was her tender nature, she asked of her husband, "Kurapica didn't tell you that he has a girlfriend, did he?"

"I'm right here, mother," Kurapica called, trying to not appear amused.

Ianto shook his head, his lips in a mock frown; Sianni flapped a hand at her son, signaling him to silence, and that she was simply addressing his father. "Well, does he have a girlfriend?"

Ianto bobbed his head a little. "Well, he has friends."

"Friends—?"

"Two boys and an old man," Ianto echoed what his son told him.

"An old man!"

"I call him an old man. But really, he's just two years older than me." Kurapica tried to cut in casually despite his mother's protest and dark gazes.

"Ah." Sianni accepted it for a moment, but then she suddenly blurted, "No girls?"

"One girl."

"Girlfriend?"

"Mother!"

"Well, girlfriend?"

"No."

Sianni seemed crestfallen and relieved at the same time. Ianto wore a good-humored smile. Kurapica, in earnest, was less than amused.

"You haven't been sharing with your mother a whole lot of things," Sianni scolded her son, albeit playfully, only half-serious.

Ianto grabbed his son by the shoulders and fondly placed an arm around them. "Men talk."

Kurapica nodded.

"Fine, then." Like a spurned lover, Sianni bounded out of the room with wounded airs, her delicate nose up in the air, her eyes pinched shut forcefully.

Ianto turned to his son. "And that's why we love her." He smiled. Kurapica's amusement returned, and smiled back.

* * *

Eighteen scientists, one project. It could have been too much for a small group to take on, but they had managed, with Dr. Sarvi Henaro's detailed instructions and equipment left all to them to dabble on in utmost care.

Risking one's life for a classified project was not the exception; in fact, it was the norm. The Institute had sanctioned more than fifty hardcore experiments since its conception, and Project Lazarus was just one of the many under their most strict protection and financial aid. However, Dr. Henaro had not been joking when the one and only time he walked into a meeting with his team of scientists-there had been only ten of them then-for the first, and probably, the last time, and had he said: "Jeopardize the project, and I will personally come to you and execute you."

Dr. Henaro was not a violent man, but he was known for his extreme measures. He was not very fond of closeness with people in particular, and had been far too dedicated with his work. And then, he had to leave. Some say it was cancer; others, a disease of the blood, and yet another, a disease of the heart, and that was not far from the truth considering Dr. Henaro's genealogy of sick relatives. He had been the only successful Hunter in their family. The rest had gotten frail and died before their day.

People were wondering why he didn't amass his skills to find a cure for his disease. Instead, he spent nearly his lifetime with exotic and eclectic cultures, the Kurata most of all. "The Scarlet Eyes will not cure cancer," he kidded at that one time, and it had lightened the atmosphere. "But it's a phenomenon. We have to preserve it at its utmost. I hope you understand."

Dr. Barrow had always been strangely fond of Dr. Henaro, even if he had only encountered the man in person once. Henaro's was a familiar image in the documented photographs the team reviewed as he demonstrated old experiments; his was a familiar voice when Dr. Henaro would speak through recordings the team had also looked into as they built Project Lazarus from where Henaro had left.

Zan Tournay was before him again, in the pantry, and the older man was shuffling through his tablet once more with one hand, a mug of tea on the other. He had purposely singled Barrow out when the others had left after dinner, and into their quarters. Barrow, on the other hand, was a patient man, tolerant as always to Tournay's bag of tricks.

"It appears you wanted to speak with me," Barrow finally intoned, and the addressee looked up from his tablet. Tournay smiled.

"As a matter of fact, I do!" Tournay replied. "I'm sure you've wanted to know about the delay."

"Well, give a good reason, then," Barrow succinctly let the older scientist oblige.

"Two words, Francis: _Project Nexus_." Tournay had suddenly turned serious.

Barrow noted this immediately. "What?"

"They didn't think I'd know about it," Tournay said matter-of-factly, leaning back at his chair, taking a sip from his mug with all the sophisticated grace of a man well above his fifties.

"Project Nexus had never been sanctioned by Dr. Henaro," Barrow said tersely.

"Neither was it Henaro's business," Tournay said. "Until…"

"Until what?"

Tournay sighed. He reached into his laboratory coat pocket and produced a small flash drive. "Here." He motioned to his tiny laptop just across him. "Plug it in there."

Barrow did as he was told without protest, for once. He scanned through the files. One particular file caught his attention. His gaze hardened.

"Does Kurapica know about this?"

"Well, it had always been your official duty to let the boy know."

Barrow dismissed the annoyance Tournay was issuing from himself again. "So Kurapica doesn't know." He ran a hand across his face, suddenly feeling drained and ponderous.

"You're really concerned about the boy's welfare, are you not?" Tournay finished his tea, and gently replaced the mug on the table. A small ring of tea had stained the surface, as Tournay usually placed his mug on the same spot.

Barrow didn't answer. There was only a dark scowl on his face.

"The boy doesn't have to know everything… yet." Tournay stood up to where Barrow was seated, still glaring at the tiny laptop screen before him.

Barrow, at last, spoke. "So when do you plan for me to tell him, then?" He did not take his eyes of the screen.

It took long moments before Tournay spoke, and it was in a tone that was firm—and it did not directly answer Barrow's question. "Project Lazarus has no affiliation with Project Nexus whatsoever. Project Nexus is a renegade project. I still don't know why the Institute sanctioned it. In fact, my guess is that the Institute themselves have washed their hands off it."

"I know little of Project Nexus, Zan," Barrow confessed. "Will it be of any help if I knew anything more about it?"

Tournay took a seat next to his colleague. "Just this: Project Lazarus was made to create. Project Nexus was made to destroy."

Barrow's forehead wrinkled, and his eyes were ablaze, but confusion remained in them. "You want to stop Project Nexus."

Tournay noncommittally shrugged. "I'm a scientist working on Project Lazarus. I have no business with Project Nexus."

Barrow's eyes narrowed. "And yet you have information on it."

Tournay was silent for a while. The humming of the facility's air-conditioning filled the void. Barrow was surprised, however, at how stumped Tournay seemed. The older man was genuinely in deep thought. A fist was cupping his chin. The smile had disappeared completely from his face.

"Zan," Barrow went on when his colleague failed to reply, "If this is not Project Lazarus's business, let it be. Dr. Henaro will know about Nexus sooner or later. Then he may give further instructions."

Tournay addressed Barrow once more. He had shaken himself off his meditative pose. "I was hoping that, actually."

"How exactly did you get this information?" Barrow sharply asked of Tournay. "This is dangerous, Zan. The knowledge of Nexus may jeopardize Lazarus. And you know what will happen if we jeopardize Lazarus."

Tournay merely sighed. "The Institute was not so careful about Nexus. Somehow unwittingly, information just leaked to me."

"Zan, I'm inclined to believe that Nexus was not the reason you told the rest of the team."

Tournay considered. "You're right, Francis. Becoming as perceptive as the boy, eh?" His smile returned.

Barrow ignored the snide remark. "Then what did you tell the team?"

Tournay looked around before turning to Barrow. "I've made sure this room isn't tapped before we had the conversation. I simply told the team that we further monitor the two clones—Ianto and Sianni—before waking up the rest. That we can never be too sure."

"Too sure of what?"

Tournay raised his hands in mock defenselessness. "It was just a reason, Francis. Also, I've wanted to further monitor the couple myself. They seem well adjusted enough. The boy seems well adjusted enough to them."

"Then what could be the problem? Not that I encourage you to resume waking up the others," Barrow continued.

Tournay's voice was low. "It was nearly imperative that we monitor the clones in the entire spectrum of emotions. From sadness, happiness, anger… and yes, aggression."

Barrow scoffed as though he were told a cruel joke. "You wouldn't want that, Tournay. I assure you."

Tournay nodded. "Of course. Now, just to let you know, I don't plan to aggravate them in any way. I just want things to play out a bit longer."

"Just like a nice, old-fashioned experiment," Barrow sighed; he was actually surprised that he was _not_ surprised with what Tournay said, if that made any sense.

Tournay was silent again before he stood up and placed an amiable hand on Barrow's shoulder. "Let's just put Project Nexus out of our heads for a while, hmm? I admit that this is only the tip of the iceberg, but none of the other clones should be awakened while Project Nexus is operating."

"Wh—"

"No more questions, Francis. I've let you know more than what was necessary." Tournay straightened himself and picked out his empty mug on his way out of the pantry. "You're dismissed, Francis." He then started walked away.

Tournay, somehow, had left the flash drive and laptop for Barrow to further investigate at his leisure. Suspicion crept into Barrow's mind, but he knew better than Tournay being completely acrimonious as to put all of them in danger. Tournay was simply giving Barrow a choice.

Barrow took it… but within his limits.

* * *

**A/N: **Yes this fic isn't even done it and I'm already planning a SEQUEL. *cackles, thunder and lightning* I'm sure some of you may have already figured out that it will be all about Project Nexus.

And yes, "Nexus" is once again a cliché name, but I'll explain why I picked it when I begin the sequel. xD (Excited much). If you do have any idea, don't broadcast it and just PM me. :P I don't want to spoil it for the others. xDD

As always, reviews, comments, and friendly ahoy's are very welcome! :D

Cheers!

DW-chan :3


	10. Ten: Dissolution

***HxH Disclaimer***

**Author's Notes:** And I'm back! :D Dear readers, I apologize for not having updated for some weeks. Had a series of family visits from abroad that kept my hands full. I couldn't focus on my chappies (plus, I was ADHD-ing here and there). Hehe. ^^;;;;

I'd like to thank my faithful, beloved readers Kiniro-chan, Raywof Shibelt, Bai-Feng, LordOfTheWest, Bai-Feng, a guest reader, Olhana, Faith Yoite, Nispedana, and kunoich79—a new and very welcome reviewer—for their uplifting reviews! :D

Finally, managed to finish this chapter. ^^ Here we go. ^^

P.S. As of writing this chapter, I've finally watched "Phantom Rouge" and only realized how quite similar the elements are with the eyes and bringing people back from the dead… sort of. ^^ Only, I have to admit, Omokage's ability is ten times creepier. O_o

* * *

Living Things  
By: DW-chan

_**Ten: Dissolution**_

_The knowledge of Nexus may jeopardize Lazarus._

_This is dangerous, Zan._

Francis Barrow recalled his words to the older scientist as he turned the tiny flash drive between his fingers—it was like a metal wasp so small that it disappeared in his palm. This small device already contained information that was not for his eyes, or for him to grasp in any larger amount. Tournay had already gone too far in surmising the intentions of Project Nexus. _Project Nexus was made to destroy_, Tournay had told him.

Destroy what? The clones?

He felt iciness rack his spine and wash over his body, and it stayed in his hands. He wanted to hold his hands aloft to see if they trembled, but they only remained in fists at his sides. _No, not the clones_, he thought. That was too easy a guess, and any wrong presumption can lead to rash acts.

He had grown familiar with what he knew, as far as what Tournay had revealed to him. In less than a gigabyte of data, he already witnessed how intricate Project Nexus was and could be—especially with that one bit of information which he wanted to tell Kurapica about, as soon as discretion let him. Right now, he was surely frozen in a predicament of its own intricacy.

The team behind Nexus seemed gifted with an acute, ruthless intelligence. What if it had been their intention for Tournay to know? What if a part of their system had been alerted when Tournay was able to access their data? Barrow continued to have tenacious faith on the older man. Tournay wasn't always a pleasant man, and he masked the inner workings of his mind with impish sarcasm and irksome heartlessness.

But to be deceiving in a nefarious, twisted way? Zan was a scientist, not a mercenary. In all the years Barrow knew him, he saw a man of science, an individual that worked diligently days and nights, a voice of authority that directed the team numerous times when indecision lingered for far longer than was convenient. If he did something that was outside the knowledge of the team, he had valid reasons, even if not all of them held Barrow in confidence.

Surely he knew Zan more than to take him for an ill-plotting bastard, and instead give him credit for being a decent person.

Barrow unclasped his hand; instantaneously, it began to tremble that he nearly dropped the flash drive. He brought it close to eye level; he blinked back sweat, trying to keep his hand from shaking. He held it close enough to see a name label: _Z. Tournay. 16 GB_. The flash drive could hold enough information he dared to collect—if he ever dared to continue where Tournay had left.

His mind wandered to Kurapica, to Ianto and Sianni, to the forty other clones asleep in their pods, knowing only the safety of their memories and floating dreams. He stared at the flash drive until it was nothing but a dark, square-ish haze in front of him.

In his earlier days as a scientist, Barrow had turned a callous eye to gut feeling, and the adage "follow your heart" was but a mere child's tale. However, at this instant, and as he licked his lips in nervous habit, his mind slowly cleared. He had tried his best to be Project Lazarus's conscience. This time, it was _his_ turn to be his _own_ conscience.

Kurapica will know about Project Nexus, and in due time.

As if by some magnetic force, he drew his hand away from his face, away from his body. He settled the flash drive gently on top of Zan Tournay's tiny laptop. His hand lay there for a while, but not because Barrow was having second thoughts; somehow, he felt as though he was parting from a deadly ordeal, and in his own dismal way, he was wishing it farewell.

He lifted his hand from the laptop, knowing full well that Zan Tournay will return for it.

And also, perhaps, he could be wrong.

* * *

In one of the vastest conference rooms in the facility, a sole figure sat. The room was dark and empty with many large, white tables. The lone presence of the room settled itself with forbearing ease on one of the chairs: not quite an old man, but with a slightly bent back. He turned his head when Dr. Zan Tournay stepped in.

"Dr. Henaro," Tournay addressed the presence. "I thought we'd never hear from you again!" He failed to hide the surprise in his voice, which remained bright, robust, and even more spirited than usual. "You may have—"

"Yes, I have seen the Kurata boy," the voice interjected; it was firm and yet had a certain rusty timbre to it, like a room dusted in cobwebs, as though ill from disuse.

"Ah, of course, but have you only arrived today…?"

"I took the underground shuttle."

Tournay had known of the underground route but had never taken it himself. He continued, "Dr. Henaro, don't take this wrongly; your visits are more than welcome, especially when the team had wondered where you have disappeared to, but to come unannounced and undetected—"

From the shadows, tinged with the ghostly pale radiance of a single lamp which lit Dr. Henaro's table, Zan Tournay saw the Hunter-Scientist's half-smile. "I guess old habits die hard, Dr. Tournay. In my younger days, I've always marveled at my stealth." The voice was friendly, even emotional, but there was something about it that sent a chill in Tournay bones. That kept the scientist rooted to the ground, only a few meters away from Henaro. A foreboding held him.

"So you've seen the Kurata boy." Tournay tried to decide on how to further his statement.

"The last, living one," said Henaro. Slowly, he stood up, with a little difficulty. A tiny sound, like stone hitting stone, echoed through the massive, empty hall as his cane tapped the floor. Henaro took a few steps into the light. He propped himself with the cane. He wore a simple suit, hardly a tailored one, and it seemed to hang loosely around his frail-looking frame. The man had ruddy skin, with an astonishingly kind face and piercing green eyes that faded little with age.

"I saw his parents. I saw the clones. Poor, young one, and yet he is fortunate." He looked distant, and his brows curled. Tournay looked at the man, close to his age, wondering what his brilliant mind held, what machinations were brewing in his head, even when he had resigned years ago. He did not look healthy, but with the aid of his cane, he was steady on his feet. "A surrogate family, and all too real."

"Their memories have integrated well."

"As I have witnessed."

"How long have you been here?"

"A day before I announced my arrival to you, Dr. Tournay."

Tournay's smile grew false, until his lips formed a grim curve. The day before, he had spoken to Barrow about Project Nexus. An involuntary twitch on his left eyelid gave away his slowly mounting unease. Henaro seemed to have caught it. His cloudy, verdant gaze held an authority Tournay could not entirely fathom.

Yet Henaro casually resumed the conversation. "I've staked my whole life on this study, on Project Lazarus. I'm pleased the team did well… well enough."

Tournay gave an informal nod. "Do you wish to speak with the team?"

"It's enough that I speak with you."

"How about the Kurata family… the boy…?"

"Soon enough."

"You had waited _years_ for this."

"I'm ill, Tournay, not dying. Not just yet." A bittersweet smile formed on Henaro's thin lips. He still spoke with a slight foreign accent, now only barely traceable. "I will speak with Kurapica when I can."

When Tournay did not speak for a while, Henaro turned to resume his seat once more by the table. His face was in shadows yet again.

Tournay kept his an unshaken demeanor when he found his voice. "So you know the boy's name."

"Ever since I made the list to identify the bodies many years ago, Dr. Tournay."

"None of the team was able to secure a formal report to you ever since you arrived."

"The files only needed my handprint, doctor." There was a hint of a smile with how he spoke. Dr. Henaro, after all, was the original head of the Project, its creator; Lazarus was his brainchild. He was his own authority.

Tournay chose his words carefully. "How much do you know?"

"Much," Henaro's cobwebbed voice replied.

"I see," Tournay said after nodding slowly. His fingers fidgeted. His smile had nearly gone.

Henaro shifted rather tiredly; he leaned partially on his cane even as he sat. "You were kind enough to let Barrow know of Nexus."

Tournay searched for Henaro's gaze in the hazy light. His fingers continued to fidget that he had to keep one of his hands in his laboratory coat pocket. "It had to be done."

Henaro spoke after a moment. "But it was not your place."

Again, Henaro managed himself to his feet again. He took deliberate steps, his cane tapping rhythmically on the tiled floor, towards Zan Tournay, who was taller of the two men, but Henaro still commandeered a more regal air.

"I've known you to be man of little sentiment, Dr. Tournay," Henaro said. There was keen understanding in his eyes. "You prized your profession. You wanted results as much as I did."

A lopsided grin, somehow, painted itself on Tournay's face. It was not because of the praise, he was certain; it was his own unease, an emergent, besetting discomfort. "I respect you, Dr. Henaro. The team respected your work, took it as their own. But your business seems to be with me."

Henaro nodded slowly, half-absently, half-knowingly.

"Then what—" began Tournay.

"Jeopardize Project Lazarus, and I will execute you," Henaro reminded him tersely.

Zan Tournay stopped short. At the back of his mind, he knew that that was Henaro's intent, apart from seeing the Kurata youth and the wakened clones with his own eyes, like a distant voyeur, like a seemingly attached parent who wanted to remain anonymous to his unsuspecting child, and can only, in the meantime, watch from the outskirts.

"Tournay, I am not a cruel man. And yet I meant what I said all those years ago. Your probing on Project Nexus will someday cost us. The Nexus team is sharp, sharper than any of us can ever know. And yet I have entrusted the secrecy of Project Lazarus to you, which should remain hidden until the time is right."

Tournay was straightforward; his grin remained, and a light was in his eyes. "Ah, so my favor was really a disfavor."

"I appreciate you taking the risk, but it was a risk, nonetheless. It was your choice," Henaro pointed out. "A choice with consequences you are willing to bear."

Tournay's smile was nearly genuine. "I have warned Barrow about sentiment."

"A disadvantage." Henaro nodded. "And yet, the heart works in mysterious ways. Only a few know how it works."

The taller scientist unknowingly bowed his head in stupefied pondering. "That boy," he began, visibly referring to Kurapica, "will grow up knowing his family again." The words escaped him like fog from a cloud.

Henaro's features softened with a smile. "Your own motivation surprises you." His bent form withstood his own weight patiently—the last moments with one of the top members of his team were still precious to him. "And yet this was something you knew all along, something that you have fought with all your might as you kept your composure, fooling Barrow, the team, and most of all, yourself."

Tournay did not resist; his fingers had stopped their fidgeting; a new sense of calm, like a warm blanket, folded itself upon him. "You have remembered Zascha."

"Many years ago," said Henaro, "you have told me of a nephew whom you swore to treat as your own son. And yet you traded that opportunity to be with the team and work on the Project. You said there were no regrets."

"And I believed that," replied Tournay.

"You did." Henaro continued, "And then you risked trading the Project's security and secrecy for the same reason you have abandoned all these years."

"Still," Tournay's tone was in its old, gregarious self again. "There were no regrets."

A final understanding was sealed between the two men. _Risking one's life for a project was the norm, rather than the exception._ There were no contracts, but there was no need. Tournay nodded as Henaro walked back to the table and silently placed a tiny syringe filled with a toxic liquid on its smooth, pristine surface. It seemed to glow like a tiny cerulean lightning bug.

"You know what to do," Henaro told Tournay, almost casually, placidly. Yet he looked kind, with a twisted form of compassion. "There will be no pain." He looked at Tournay once again with his emerald gaze, faintly effervescent like the syringe that stood waiting for Tournay to administer on himself. "Zan Tournay, you were one of the best in the team. But you will not betray Project Lazarus any longer."

"You will tell Zascha."

"Zascha will know."

"He will be twenty-two this year."

"A fine young man."

"And Francis Barrow?"

"He will understand."

"Is he in danger?"

"Barrow is one of those few who know their hearts well, doctor. One of the few."

Henaro dragged himself with his cane, little by little, until he had walked past Zan Tournay. As the doors, with their customary _hiss_ slid open, Henaro acknowledged the erstwhile scientist without turning his head. "Goodbye, Dr. Tournay. My only regret is that I could not do it by my own hand."

He stepped out, the sound of stone on stone echoing in the vastness, until it disappeared as the door slid shut again. Tournay stood there, wrapped in the pale light of the solitary lamp by the table, and the syringe lay there, waiting.

_Don't get too attached to the boy. It would be to your own disadvantage_, he had told Barrow not too long ago. Kurapica had wanted him dead. Barrow had jested on wanting him dead. It had been a jest, only a jest, a passing witticism.

Tournay soundlessly laughed, good-humoredly, in childlike wonderment, unbecoming of his age. His Zascha was no Kurapica, and Kurapica was no Zascha, but lately, as he watched Barrow's paternal regard for the Kurata youth, and as he watched the boy mingle with his long-lost family—Zascha, the nephew he had never really known, and Kurapica, the boy once orphaned of his clan, had gradually an guilefully merged into one.

He resigned himself to being a fool to fate.

* * *

Sianni felt a dull, throbbing pain shoot up her fingers. It surprised her for a moment, and she dropped the earring she was trying to secure on her left ear. She only wore the earring she had found by her dresser table the morning she awoke from her clone-sleep out of girlhood habit. It felt odd, somehow, to be wearing something that had been Ianto's gift to her a lifetime ago, but could have been simply copied by a jewel-smith in this present time.

She wore it, anyway. She glimpsed at her reflection for a while at the dresser table, wondering why she suddenly felt that something was amiss. She had to trust it this time, she thought. The last time she held such a feeling was the night they were all killed.

Almost immediately, she turned away from the mirror and walked out of the room, in search for her husband and son. Ianto should know about this. But Kurapica, her once little boy—would he understand the instinctive disquiet which she felt in her bones?

By the time she reached Ianto, she felt as though her legs were like lead. Her husband was in one of the lounge rooms, bent over a magazine with an expression of furrowed brows over almond-slit eyes. Her son was nowhere in sight.

"Ianto—"

The man smiled. "Sianni—you're awake! I was just reading through this idea—"

"Do you feel it, Ianto?" Sianni said suddenly. She did not mean to rudely interrupt her husband, or for her voice to darkly convey her worry.

"Feel what—?" As soon as Sianni was an arm's length away from him, he drew her near.

"The pain, Ianto, do you feel the pain?" Her voice was suddenly shrill that Ianto immediately dropped the magazine to comfort his visibly distressed wife.

"Sianni, what are you talking about? What pain?"

Sianni nearly threw his hands at him, palms wide. "They're like knives under the skin, Ianto. I can feel it in my hands. Don't you feel it?"

Ianto seemed to be holding back panic as he surveyed his hand, silently listening to his body for any form of pain Sianni described to him.

"There isn't… I don't feel any pain, Sianni. But what made you think I'd feel it too…?" Ianto knew better than to question her, as he had always respected, if not trusted, his wife's peace of mind.

Sianni swallowed hard but she kept her voice low, as though creating commotion would attract unwanted company. "Because we're in bodies not our own, Ianto! Don't you remember? We're just copies, only copies."

"Sianni—" Ianto was dumbfounded and speechless. Sianni would not speak of herself, even in her "borrowed" form in a disparaging manner, not when the word _copies_ had once an effect on them when their son thought of them as nothing but such. However, that was not the point of urgency now. His wife was in pain and yet he was not, and he especially had to take into account what Sianni thought of her—_their_—situation.

"I'll call Dr. Barrow," Ianto offered. The scientist only crossed his mind because he had seen a trusting light in Kurapica's eyes towards the man.

However, Sianni seemed not to be listening at all. "Kurapica, where is Kurapica?" she asked, almost frantic. Her forehead began to glisten with sweat. Flickers of scarlet began to dart in her eyes.

"He's—he's in his room…"

"Don't tell him. Don't go to him. Not yet." Then she acknowledged what her husband said earlier. "Yes, call Dr. Barrow, maybe he'll know."

"Know of what?"

There was a drifting moment of quiet between husband and wife. Sianni gripped Ianto's arms as she tried to hold him with her frightened, confused eyes. They were now glowing with a dim but ever-growing crimson.

"Ianto," she said hushedly. "I think I'm dying."

Something like a blow to the head hit Ianto when he heard his wife's words. His world seemed to slow down for a prolonged instant as he looked into Sianni's crimson eyes. He felt so helpless, so useless, not knowing exactly what she felt. He can only guess her fear, her pain…

"How could you be sure?" His voice was quiet as well, but he was starting to mirror the fear in her voice.

But before Sianni could reply, Ianto had scooped her up into his arms, and without another moment's hesitation, took her to where he wished Dr. Barrow would be staying.

* * *

Ianto did find Dr. Barrow in the reservatory office, but Dr. Barrow, on the other hand, did not find Dr. Tournay where he thought he would see the older scientist, which was usually in the pantry. By mid-morning, the older man would have had retrieved his laptop, and he would simply be carrying on as though everyday wove just like any other.

Dr. Barrow had Ianto bring Sianni to the recovery room at once, and had Dr. Ryger sent for. He then found the man he was looking for in one of the conference rooms, the main one, and from the looks of Zan Tournay, the man seemed he barely had any sleep.

"Did you know that this would happen?" Barrow demanded of Tournay. When he thought that he had the other man's full regard, he shoved a tablet-like device into Tournay's hands.

Tournay seemed to have been roused from a trance. He simply blinked as he beheld the half-enraged, half-flustered Barrow before him, and he glanced at the numbers that blinked at the tablet's screen.

"And what would that be, Francis?" Tournay asked of his colleague. His voice seemed less hearty than usual. Barrow did not care at that moment.

"Look at Sianni's vitals. Look!"

Tournay looked at the tablet screen. It did not assure Barrow of anything good and well when Tournay's gaze was unsettling and bewildered.

"Francis," said Tournay, with no traces of a smile on his face whatsoever. "Is Sianni…"

"She's dying."

To Barrow's surprise, Tournay had flung the tablet to the nearest table, as if in disgust.

"Zan, did you not think that this would happen?" Barrow's sullen anger had now turned into anxiousness. He stopped himself from accusing the other scientist any further. After all, he and Tournay were only two people of the team. There were eighteen of them. But they had been eighteen of the best _until_—

"Did I _not_ think?" Tournay repeated, calmly, but somewhat wearily. "If I knew this would happen I would have had us work harder and longer, Francis."

"And—?" Barrow could not believe what he was hearing. He could not believe his own disposition. He had to think clearly or Sianni will die within the day, if not sooner.

Tournay did not say anything.

"Damn it, Zan, _damn it all_! There has to be something _else_, something more than just this…"

Tournay seemed to be in his own little world for a while. Barrow, even in his rising desperation, tried to read Tournay's tiniest expressions. It was as if Tournay was recalling an old memory, dusty and long-forgotten, until this moment.

"Francis, I don't guarantee this is going to work, but…"

"We'll take the chance, Zan!" His voice somehow elicited a look from Tournay even Barrow did not expect, but Barrow continued, nonetheless. "Didn't we always take those chances?"

The older scientist seemed to walk with a limp, but he guided the younger man to their destination: a chamber that seemed so spotless and sterile, and with only steel beams and transparent tubes over their heads that transported specimens back and forth as a visual break from the seemingly endless white.

They were soon in front of a sealed metal vault-like door, and Tournay began punching in some numbers. There was a series of beeps, and then Tournay turned to Barrow.

"This would need your thumbprint, Francis," came the scientist's order.

There was little time to wonder why this procedure only needed his thumbprint in particular. His thumbprint was set, and then the vault slowly began to unlock itself.

Tournay reached into the vault and took out a cylinder which was also sealed in turn. Inside the cylinder were syringes, identical to the those which contained the "reviving serum," but the color of the liquid inside these syringes was a dull, translucent green.

"The cylinder," said Tournay, tapping the dark, flat surface on the side of the cylinder, "would need Kurapica's thumbprint."

Barrow's eyes only widened. "But how did you program in his thumbprint before this—?"

"Henaro had somehow acquired the boy's thumbprint pattern some time ago. He's a Hunter, perhaps there were records... he has his ways. As I said, Francis, there are no guarantees. I thought—"

Barrow caught the sudden, unsuspected remorse in Tournay's voice. "You thought… _what_, Zan?"

Zan's smile returned to his face. "I thought that I would have the chance to work with Kurapica longer, and get the exact impression of his DNA. He is, after all, the only living naturally-born Kurata after all these years."

"Zan…" Barrow's voice was low and perplexed, and yet he did not hide the slightest horror in his voice. "Did you mean for us to… to clone Kurapica too?"

To Barrow's surprise, Tournay burst in laughter, but it did not have the full force of Zan's usual sardonicism. "By heavens, Francis! No, no! No, not Kurapica." And yet, the man still seemed to hold so many secrets. The cylinder which Barrow held now was only one of them. He had not known of its existence until today.

"Sianni will only need one syringe," Tournay continued, "but she will have to stay in her capsule again for a few more months. I gave Ryger instructions, Francis. I'm sorry that you had to know about all this in this way."

Barrow felt the keen urgency to simply run off, find Kurapica, and save Sianni's life, but something stopped him. "Zan," began the younger scientist. "You old bastard. You sound like you're giving your last words. What's this about?"

Tournay's smile remained. "Because they are."

Francis Barrow wondered if he understood. "What?"

"My last words. They are my last words." Tournay grinned. "At least, some of them."

The younger scientist was frozen in his tracks.

"Francis, don't give me that look. I know I'm a heartless son of a bitch so don't give me that sorry look." There was genuine humor in Tournay's voice.

It finally dawned to Barrow. He didn't know what else to say, but, "Henaro—"

"Well, now _that's_ an old bastard who's been right about you, Francis."

Barrow did not pretend to understand, but before he knew it, he was gripping Tournay's shoulder.

"How much time do you have left?"

Tournay looked at Barrow with good-natured eyes. "Sianni needs you now, Francis."

"How much time?" repeated Barrow, forcefully.

"Frankly, my friend, I thought I had lesser time than what I have now."

Barrow released his grip from Tournay. "If I leave you now," he said, "you'll die alone."

Tournay's eyes were unusually bright for a dying man's. "You're goddamn sap, you know that, Francis? You've got your heart everywhere. The devil himself would have your sympathy."

But Barrow did not retort. There was no surprise in his eyes when Tournay slumped to the floor. He knelt beside the dying man. Tournay was growing pallid before his eyes.

"This was about Nexus, wasn't it?" Barrow said softly.

"Henaro was right about you all along…" came Tournay's words, words which he had said earlier, and the man was merely repeating them, his gaze shadowed. Barrow lowered his eyes. He knew he was losing Tournay to a kind of delirium. "He was right," Tournay echoed, "Or… you'd be… dead too…"

Barrow could not restrain himself. "Zan, you've always been a cunning old bastard, but I know there's more to you than just being a heartless son of a bitch."

Tournay's eyes were now glazed. "You… will tell Kurapica…"

"Tell him… what?"

"Ah, sentiment…" said Tournay in an apparent daze, but he sounded as though he were simply remembering a pleasant dream. And then, he was silent.

A sinking feeling shot through Barrow. He pressed two fingers on Zan Tournay's throat. The pulse had gone.

_Honorable suicide_, Barrow thought in a stupor. He knew he should feel confusion, a great confusion, but he only felt a great loss. He tried to brush away the thousand questions from his head, knowing now that there would no longer be a voice to answer them. He had to find the answers to his own questions from now on.

"You're an ass, Zan, you know that," Barrow told his friend, fondly, for the last time. Tournay's eyes had closed and for a moment he looked like one of the slumbering clones, in their blissful sea of unperturbed dreams.

Tournay's body will be taken care of soon, and while the team will indeed have questions, they will be ready to understand. Right now, a Kurata family needed him. He stood to leave the chamber, but without seemingly seeing a figure in a corner, hidden in the shadows. And at the back of his mind, he thought he heard the sound of tapping, like stone against stone, echoing throughout the chamber walls.

* * *

**A/N:** To be honest, I've had some difficulty forming this chapter, after a sort-of hiatus and all that. I'm sure some of you might be confused or disoriented with this new chapter and all the dealings with it, especially when it's dominated by OC interaction. Hope it's not too bad, though!

And yea, so I've introduced yet another OC (Zascha Tournay. And yes, Zascha can also be a boy's name. xD), who will be present in the sequel. Gosh I'm getting ahead of myself, and I'm not even done with Part I! :P Also it's an excuse to justify the mention of Zascha in this chapter. xD

Project Nexus will finally be made clearer in the next chapter as well.

As always, let me know what you think of this belated chapter, and for some, a long-awaited update. ^^ Bring in the remarks, reviews, etc. etc. ^^

Cheers!

DW-chan :3


	11. Eleven: Memory

***HxH Disclaimer***

**Author's Notes:** Okay, fast update. :P I'll manage to "rush" through this one, since I'm overdue with the fic (according to the personal schedule that I have set, hehe), anyway. Have to finish this before school opens again. At least, the first few weeks of school will relatively still be light. :D

Once more, thanking my most awesome reviewers kunoich79, a guest reader, Kiniro-chan, Olhana, LordOfTheWest, Bai-Feng, and (happiness) a new reviewer, Kimnd! ^^ I think the boon and bane of a lot of readers and writers are plot twists and character deaths. xD I really didn't expect the last chapter to have as much hits but hey, I'm very glad that I still got readers despite Kurapica not really making an appearance.

Let's do this. :3

* * *

Living Things  
By: DW-chan

_**Eleven: Memory**_

Francis Barrow expected pain, any sort of pain, from being flung to the floor, or thrown onto a nearby wall—anything that would certainly damage him in an utmost physical way, when he saw Kurapica grip him by the side of his laboratory coat.

But no pain met him. The youth simply held him by the coat, close to the neck, above the chest, only slightly constricting his movements. He saw Kurapica's blazing red eyes; he saw the palpable fear in them, the disarray, the conflicting thoughts that surely were chasing themselves in his head. Barrow had to study him awhile, but in the quickest way possible to know that the boy was somewhere in between berserk and prudent.

"She will not die," Kurapica told him, steadily, as though by simply stating it that it could be true. "You will tell me that my mother will not die." His grip neither tightened nor loosened. Barrow's eyes narrowed for a moment when he thought he saw the faintest glimmer of chain-like snakes wrap themselves around the boy's hand before disappearing again.

Barrow knew better than to sugarcoat Sianni's condition. "I can't say," he replied to Kurapica. It was only then he realized that his voice was quaking, but it was not the fear of possibly being maimed by an enraged Kurata. It was the genuine fear of actually losing a human life due to the loftiness of Project Lazarus's ambitions, only to be subjected to human error.

_Human error._

Their game at playing gods was certainly coming to an end.

The scientist only felt a small push as Kurapica released him. A veil of exhaustion seemed to have enveloped the young man, but the luminous crimson of his eyes remained. Barrow took this instant to speak. Every second was precious in determining whether Sianni would live or die.

"We may be able to save her," Barrow said quietly, as calmly as he could. Kurapica's weary gaze met his. The boy's eyes were beginning to mirror a semblance of tears, but they never fell. His eyes shone like shattered rubies. It was both a magnificent and frightening sight.

"I want to believe you," was all the boy said. There was also an implication to how Kurapica said it, as though there was an unspoken, _What choice to I have?_

There was something bold and perfunctory in Barrow's movements as he took out the cylinder, and took Kurapica by the shoulder, which the seemingly dazed youth did not fight off. Barrow had no time to wonder that this was the first time he actually had any physical contact with Kurapica, and it was at the worst circumstances. It was like coming in contact with marbled oak: cold yet full of tenacious life.

There was no time for formalities: the explanations should only come after. "I need your thumbprint here, Kurapica." He produced the cylinder to the boy. "No questions now, no questions. This can save her life."

To his surprise, Kurapica took the cylinder from him, and affixed his thumbprint on the small side panel. There was a beep, and the cylinder opened; a syringe rose out where a hand can take it comfortably. The boy simply handed the cylinder back, and Barrow wordlessly took it.

"Damn you," the youth said, his voice solid and almost neutral.

Everything after appeared like a rush, both in fast-forward and slow motion, as though Barrow were observing things out of his body and through a movie reel. He barged into the recovery room; he tried to keep his focus on the visibly pained and colorless face of Sianni, and not on Ianto's dark and querulous gaze at him, or at Ryger's panicked, quivering eyes.

In a blink of an eye, he had made a makeshift tourniquet out of a rubber glove so an essential vein on Sianni's arm would protrude from her skin, and he had injected the syringe's contents into her body. He ignored the shock on Ianto's eyes, and even the man's attempts to rip him away from his wife. But Barrow only imagined the latter; Ianto did not seem to possess his son's belligerence.

"Dr. Barrow?" It was Sianni. He momentarily looked up at the sound of her voice.

"Yes?" he said gently. His hand only remained steady to administer the syringe on Sianni. Aferwards, it began to apparently shake again.

"Is it… is it because we're only living borrowed lives, isn't it?"

Barrow quietly slid the tourniquet from Sianni's arm so it did not hurt her. "No, Sianni." He tried to meet her eyes, which were a dull scarlet; the grey of her eyes was beginning to surface, and the color on her face was returning. "It's not your fault. It's… ours."

Ianto was at his wife's side once more, and when he spoke to Barrow, his voice had certain timbre to it—not quite angry, but with a molten edge. "You can only steer a ship so far, doctor." Barrow tried to decipher the philosophy of the man's words, and Ianto spoke again. "It seems like it's no longer in your hands."

"I…" Barrow did not know what to say. He could only feel the relief wash over him as Sianni's breaths began to ease, and the paleness of her skin was washing away. He signaled Ryger to take Sianni's vitals once more.

"N-normal," Ryger marveled, even more relieved than Barrow.

There was a hiss of an opening door as Kurapica entered the recovery room, face flushed, but eyes no longer in their scarlet state. The boy's and his father's gazes met. He then walked past Barrow as though he were invisible, and he went to his mother's bedside, knelt, clasped her hands, and placed them on his forehead in unspoken solace.

Barrow felt weak at the knees. Tournay was dead. Sianni was alive. But what happened to Sianni could happen to Ianto soon enough; it could have happened to the rest of the clones had they been roused before their time. He did not notice the empty syringe fall from his fingers and roll innocuously onto the carpeted floor.

"Josef…?" he addressed Dr. Ryger.

"Thirty minutes, Francis," Ryger replied, as though remembering a protocol which Tournay had assigned to him for a moment like this. "Then we take her back to her capsule."

Barrow tried not to meet Ianto's judicious gaze on him, but he failed miserably.

* * *

"It's sudden and rapid cell degeneration, Francis," Dr. Ryger found the explanation. "I'd like to emphasis on _sudden_. In God's good earth had I not imagined that this would really happen. Nearly two years in the capsule, waiting to be awakened, and all that time, all vitals were normal…"

There was a ghost of a bitter smile on Barrow's lips. "Human error, Josef." He wearily leaned forward to clasp his hands in front of him where he sat, in another small, closet-like room adjacent to the recovery room. "Nothing more, nothing less." He took a sideward glimpse at the Kurata family to find Kurapica holding his bedridden mother's hand, and the boy was looking at him with his patented unreadable expression. But the youth's lips were hard. Barrow could not read minds, but he surmised that Kurapica was unsure whether to further condemn the Project's very existence, or to thank Barrow for saving his mother's life.

Ambivalence. Kurapica seemed to have known nothing but conflicting thoughts, emotions, and battling aspirations of his own future ever since he stepped into the Project. Barrow was surprised that Kurapica had kept his sanity thus far. Had Barrow not been subjected in the very madness of cloning in the first place, he himself would have lost his own mind long ago. Barrow only needed to take everything in stride. After all, he chose to remain in Project Lazarus for a number of reasons both known and still unknown to him.

"Remember, Josef, that years before Project Lazarus, cloning experiments had not become too successful. Infants born from cloning lived no longer than a few hours." _So many innocent deaths_. For a moment he wondered if the Institute ever regarded those deaths as human deaths, and provided proper burials to these motherless souls. Perhaps they did, or perhaps they never did.

"Francis," Ryger began after a while. "I've expected Zan to be here. Where is he…?"

Barrow did not expect to immediately reveal what had happened to Tournay. The Project had been going so smoothly that none of the team would be expecting an execution too soon—if not ever.

"He's not… going to be here awhile, Josef." No. He couldn't bring himself to tell Ryger. He swallowed hard. He could not bring himself to tell the team, and yet, he knew that the dreadful responsibility of letting the team know—and to have everyone move on as though a simple gale had passed—had fallen on his shoulders.

"I see." There was apparent quandary in Ryger's voice. However, the man made no further attempt to make inquiries.

"Ryger, kindly call a meeting," Barrow impulsively ensued. "As soon as Sianni is back in her capsule, we all need to talk. Project Lazarus has become too flawed. Tournay was right. None of the other clones should be wakened just yet."

"We failed, hadn't we?" Ryger's matter-of-fact way of saying it lightly took Barrow off-guard.

"No, Ryger," Barrow found himself answering. "We're not going to let this fail."

Ryger nodded, his tiny frame suddenly released from tension. He glanced at his watch and once again nodded to Barrow. "Thirty minutes."

The beginning of another lengthy ordeal awaited them all.

* * *

"How long?" Ianto asked of Barrow.

"Sianni will have to be in the capsule again for another two months," came the scientist's reply. "Recuperating will not be easy. We will have to reformulate many of our once-trusted theories in order for Sianni—and everyone else—to live full lives once they are awake..."

"Do I have to return to the capsule myself, doctor?" There was a hint of a challenge in Ianto's tone.

Barrow found the courage to finally look at Ianto eye to eye. The Kurata man's grey eyes had a familiar resoluteness, the same one which he had seen in Kurapica. There was no shaking that resolve, not even if the world caught fire.

"We'll have to see. You were wakened a day later than Sianni. We'll have to heavily monitor you in the next few hours…"

"Or maybe," Ianto offered, his quiet voice firm and unyielding. "I would never have to return to the capsule."

"Ianto—" Barrow began.

Something like a momentary hair-raising glassiness filled Ianto's eyes, but as if straightened from a slap, they instantly cleared. "Very well, Dr. Barrow," Ianto acceded. "I am, after all, in the outside world. I am at the mercy of it." The tone of challenge stayed, as if Ianto were testing the waters of a bottomless black pool.

Ianto had walked away to gather with his son and wife before Barrow could say another word.

Sianni had been laid back unto the capsule, and Kurapica had not left her side. The deep lines of worry and apprehension had marked themselves on Sianni's still-youthful features.

"Could you believe it?" Sianni said to her son and approaching husband, trying to sound cheerful, but her words came out brokenly. "Days ago I thought that I was in a dream. Well maybe… maybe I still am dreaming. And I'm just about to wake up again, and then I'll be seeing you again, and everyone else, as if all this never had happened."

"Mother…" Kurapica trailed off. He could not bring himself to let go of her hand. He was fighting for the right words to tell her. But he knew that Sianni would only see through him. He had inherited the blaze in his mother's heart. If Sianni knew her heart, she would know _his_, perhaps, even as things had changed for him during the past five years.

"I'm scared," Sianni finally admitted, the words emanating from her like a shard.

Ianto, this time, was the one who replied in his gentle, comforting way. "Our son and I are scared, too." He had taken his place at the other side of the capsule, opposite Kurapica, and was reaching out to touch his wife's cheek. Sianni's eyes began to shimmer with tears. One fell and hit Ianto's hand.

"What if I never see you again—" she choked on her words.

"You know that's a lie, mother," Kurapica said. His eyes were still their calm cerulean. A part of him wished that he was in his mother's dream-world as well, and when he woke up, he'll be in his bed, at home, and Sianni would be outside, tending the garden, or perhaps making breakfast, and she would be singing in her melodic voice an old song in their native language. It seemed like a life so far away and long ago.

"You… you'd be a good boy?" Sianni had stopped crying, and some of her obstinacy had returned. She sounded like her old, vivacious self, but with a tremulous voice. She blinked, as if realizing what she had said may seem foolish to her nearly grown-up son, but still she pressed on. "Your nen chains…"

Kurapica was still for a while. He slowly held up his right hand, his eyes blinked scarlet in a manner of seconds, and then the nen chains pulsed to existence around his fingers. There was remorse in his expression. Then the vermillion in his eyes vanished; so did the chains.

"Disobedient child," Sianni told him. But it did not sound angry or disappointed. She gave her sad smile.

"I love you, mother." He returned the sad smile.

"If this procedure would really, really make me stay with you longer when I wake up, well… I'd take it. I said I would." Sianni reached out to touch Kurapica's face. "Darling, I love you too."

Ianto tried to suppress a smile. Sianni caught it in less than a second, and with the same hand she used to touch her son's face, she whipped it lightly, in scornful jest, on Ianto's chest. "And I love you, too, dear husband."

Ianto found Kurapica's gaze again in a thread of father-son understanding. "And that's why we love her, don't we, son?"

Kurapica's smile was earnest. "Yes."

Sianni's eyes darted between Ianto and Kurapica. "I'll be seeing you again." This time, she sounded certain. She swallowed hard. The sadness in her smile waned, now replaced with silent joy. "And you two better be there when I wake up."

Kurapica found the strength to release her hand. He stooped to tenderly plant a kiss on his mother's forehead.

"Do we have a choice?" Ianto retorted with a smile.

"Goose," Sianni snapped at her husband, lovingly, using an old nickname she gave Ianto when he would tease her relentlessly.

"We'll be there," Ianto said to his wife, softly. "Sleep well, Sianni. Don't worry about us. We'll be there." He leaned over, and for the first time in many years, Kurapica saw his parents kiss again. He had always felt uneasy, as a little boy, when his parents kissed in front of him. Sometimes they would kiss in front of him just to tick him off good-naturedly, and waited until Kurapica would say, "Ewwww." He couldn't find himself to say that now.

The rest of the procedure slipped through everyone like butter. When Kurapica and Ianto finally stepped away from the open capsule, Ryger went forward and punched in a code at the capsule's side panel.

"Once the capsule closes, a harmless gas will emit through these fissures. You'll be asleep in no time, Sianni," the doctor explained.

"I'm ready," she said.

When the capsule closed, there was a slight fogging under the transparent glass, and before Sianni's eyes closed, her gaze was on her family. Then, it was over. There, she slumbered, like a fair-haired princess under ice.

Kurapica neither heard Barrow's voice call his name nor did he even feel his father's warm grasp on his shoulder. He could only remember his mother's face, the nen chains which he had not yet parted from even as she had begged him to, but then his mother's beautiful face emerged in his thoughts once more. He shook his head, smiling lopsidedly, and reprimanded himself for not telling her that she was beautiful.

Because, maybe, that chance will come again.

* * *

Ianto had chosen to stay for a bit longer in the reservatory viewing room. Kurapica, in a moment of weakness, had left the reservatory nearly as soon as Sianni had fallen asleep in her recuperation pod. He found his way up the main lounge of the facility; he was facing a deep night outside the tall glass windows. There was no moon, but the stars were strung at the zenith, like the million faraway suns that they were.

His hands were at his sides. He could not bring forth any grating emotion in his heart, not even hate or anger. He even felt a sense of emptiness. He only wanted to be alone for a while, and it felt strange to him, wanting to be alone _now_, after being alone all this years. He wanted to be alone so he could think, yet he couldn't think. His mind was drawing a blank. He realized that he did not know where to go from there. With the clones of his clan asleep, and his father left under heavy medical supervision for the slightest signs of deterioration, he felt that he had to once more wield a fate for himself.

He heard a small, tapping sound nearby. It was not a threatening sound, and Kurapica felt no need to bring up his guard. He simply turned to the sound, and was not at all surprised to see a slight man, past his middle age, by the small fountain adorning the lounge.

"May I join you?" inquired the man.

Kurapica shrugged. "The lounge is for everyone." He didn't remember seeing the man before, but then again, the facility housed more than the scientists. There was security, the maintenance staff, the mechanics…

The man smiled and limped his way towards the boy. The sound of his cane was muted as it hit the carpet.

The man was soon by his side. He only stood a little taller than Kurapica. The boy's eyes narrowed a bit, but not out of hostility. There was something oddly familiar about the man, and he could not place the familiarity. He started when the man looked at him, as if sensing his scrutiny.

"Yes, you've heard of me before," said the man.

"I didn't say anything—"

"This old man's eyes are still sharp, lad." The man jokingly tapped the side of his withering brow. "I've seen how you looked at me just a moment ago."

"Then who are you?" asked the youth.

"Dr. Sarvi Henaro," replied the man, holding up his hand. The boy's forehead furrowed for a moment, but he took the man's hand, nonetheless.

"The Father of Project Lazarus," Kurapica intoned, as though he were proclaiming a dark accolade.

"Is that what they call me?" Henaro asked with true inquisitiveness.

"That's what I named you," Kurapica offered.

"Ah."

The boy turned to Henaro, his blue eyes tried to hide his confusion in vain. "How long have you been here?"

"Well, a mere two days, Kurapica."

Kurapica tried to hide his surprise as well.

"I know your name as well, lad." There was no rising threat in the man's voice.

"Of course you would." Kurapica only wanted to sound the least bit impetuous.

Henaro gestured with his cane. "You're wondering why I've only showed up now, when I could have showed up a long time ago."

Kurapica shrugged once more. "You're also a Hunter. You had your own business."

"True." Henaro had turned to face the glass window and the burst of stars beyond. "I'm also stricken with a rare disease."

Kurapica realized that he had forgotten about that until now. "Yes, I heard."

Henaro sounded amused. "Not very chatty, are we, lad?"

Kurapica regarded him for a moment, but did not say anything. Henaro sighed.

"Your mother will be all right."

"She better be all right."

The Hunter-Scientist laughed a small laugh, surprisingly hearty and full, unbecoming for a man with a near-skeletal body ravaged with disease. "If you trust Dr. Barrow," he said, his voice kind, "you know that she, and the forty-one others of your clan, will be all right."

Kurapica wanted to say, _If I didn't trust Dr. Barrow, I'd be giving up on everything I'd ever fought for. If I didn't trust him, or anyone in Project Lazarus, I'll be hanging on to nothing_, but he continued to keep his quiet.

"Well, keep your secrets, Kurapica." Henaro smiled his wrinkled smile. "I'm only glad that I have finally met you."

Kurapica felt a strange knot in his belly. "I wish I could say the same about you, Dr. Henaro."

The man was nodding with an odd twinkle in his eye. "Well, I'll be off now. Good night, lad." Henaro began to walk off, cane pressing against the floor, his wispy frame wobbling away from sight, to a set of doors on another side of the lounge.

Just when Dr. Henaro left, the main doors of the lounge slid open.

Kurapica found Dr. Barrow by the threshold, looking haggard than usual, and older than his thirty-two years.

"There's something you need to know, Kurapica," said the man, with a silently grappling urgency.

He had spoken about trust for Dr. Barrow not a long moment ago. Now, he wasn't too sure. Kurapica nodded, acknowledging the scientist.

* * *

"It's called Project Nexus."

Kurapica sat across Dr. Barrow. The scientist had brought with him the very same files which Tournay had revealed to him. He had arrived with the judgment that Kurapica, as he had always believed from the very beginning, had the right to know. If Henaro would have his head as well, so be it.

"A renegade experiment," Kurapica repeated what the scientist said before proclaiming about Project Nexus.

"_Nexus_ means the _center, the core_. It also means _the connection, the link_." Barrow clicked another file, which revealed a small dose of information. "Though I hardly doubt that would be the reason Project Nexus was named the way it was, even when I first thought that there was a definite relation."

"Then what is it?" Kurapica had somehow mirrored Barrow's urgency.

"I'm honestly not sure yet, Kurapica," said the man, and he attempted a transparency which he wished the boy would willingly understand. "But this, I know. Project Nexus is partly about Eugenics. It is about the creation of the perfect human gene pool."

"What does that have to do with Project Lazarus, Dr. Barrow?"

"One of our theories is…" Barrow sighed, cleared his throat, and clenched his already clamped fingers. "That the Scarlet Eyes is a product of advanced human evolution. Now, this is not mutation, Kurapica. This is something that is quite the opposite. Most Institutes consider mutation as an aberration. But this…"

"I'll rephrase my question, Dr. Barrow," Kurapica said, cutting the scientist off, but trying not to sound too impudent. "What does Project Nexus have to do with the Scarlet Eyes?"

"Very similar to Project Lazarus: human cloning."

Kurapica's eyes widened, hardened. His entire body seemed to turn to stone. His jaw was set.

"Dr. Barrow, I know you've something more important to show me. Show me, then."

Barrow nodded, his eyes blinking once, as though he were pushing a heavy weight off his mind. He tapped the tiny laptop a few times; then with reckless ceremony, he flipped the laptop so that the screen was facing the Kurata youth.

"They have, also in their possession, four pairs of Scarlet Eyes."

The boy was somehow affixed to the screen. Barrow saw sheer consternation in the youth's face. Barrow deemed to continue. "That also means that they have also successfully cloned four of your clanspeople."

Forty-two in Project Lazarus, compared to four in Project Nexus. How was that hardly a competition? And yet Nexus was a renegade, unsolicited Project. They could have been shut down, but they weren't. They could have been stopped, but they haven't. Nexus held more secrets than Lazarus could ever have, it seemed. There was no knowing yet what great advantage four clones had over forty-two.

Kurapica on the other hand, felt as though his heart had jumped into a spiraling abyss. The clones were named. He knew each and every one of them from his younger days; he knew them growing up, as their village was tiny and tightly-knit that everyone somehow knew each other openly.

He saw four names, but one particular name imprinted itself in his mind the most.

He had found him.

_Pairo._

* * *

**A/N: **Yes, yes, of course I had to include Pairo in this mess, right? *cackle* The concept of the story gave me every opportunity to, so I grabbed it. xD

Project Lazarus will, for now, be coming to a close, as will Part I of my story. As I keep babbling about, Project Nexus will be the main concern of the sequel. Only a chapter-in-a-half more. ^^;;;

Leave those comments, reviews, remarks, the whole shebang right there, luvs! I welcome all sorts of new reviews from new reviewers. I really appreciate reviews; I take time to consider your feedback and see if I can tweak the following chapters according to the feedback. So yea, each remark is precious! :D

Cheers!

DW-chan :3


	12. Twelve: The Key

***HxH Disclaimer***

**Author's Notes:** I'd like to say, "I can't believe _Living Things_ is ending," but instead, it's, "Finally, it's ending! I'm behind schedule!" xD It'll be a first of completing a series story ever in my story record… which somehow doesn't count, since _Living Things_ will be tailed by a second part. :P Somehow I decided to do plot increments instead of stuffing them all in one series story. It's preference, I guess. ^^;;

Again, I can't thank my most faithful reviewers enough for keeping me going, and excited as well in putting up each and every chapter as I go! You guys are just simply AWESOME. You have no idea. ;) And that's you guys—Bai-Feng (I missed you! :D), a guest reader, Raywolf Shibelt (yay, you're back! ^^), kunoich79, Kiniro-chan, LordOfTheWest, and Paperoo (new reviewer! ^^). I always look forward to reading your reviews. *party hats and cookies*

So here it is… the twelfth chapter. ^^

* * *

Living Things  
By: DW-chan

_**Twelve: The Key**_

_Dr. Zan Tournay is dead._

Kurapica was at the meeting which Barrow had Ryger call for the Lazarus Team when he heard of the news. There was little sympathy he could feel for the "executed" scientist, and yet that was what caught his attention the most: Tournay had been _executed_. He watched the reactions of the faces that surrounded the small conference table: shock, perplexity, even blank stares.

Francis Barrow himself held a drifting look; it seemed that he was not entirely into the meeting. He slumped on his swiveling chair with legs squarely crossed, eyelids rarely fluttering, lips in a hard line. "I can not divulge the nature and reasons of his treachery," Barrow revealed, "but know that he may have done it out of supposed good intentions. Of course, I'm not encouraging anyone to do the same. We've heard Dr. Henaro's conditions years ago. I hope you have not forgotten them…"

"Does that mean that—Dr. Henaro is here…?" one of the scientists, Dr. Skev, attempted to voice out the concerns of fifteen other minds.

Francis was quick. "It was self-inflicted. He may have been given orders to commit honorable suicide. In any case, we now know that Dr. Henaro is alive and well, as he also may have communicated to Dr. Tournay before the incident."

"Shall we call an investigation?"

"No."

"Where is Dr. Tournay's body?"

"Security has taken care of it. I will contact his family soon."

"Very well."

The air was veritably condensed with unease, as if sinister thoughts had occupied the minds of every person in the room. It was true then, Barrow mused, observing the faces before him. No one had expected an execution. Everyone had believed that they were doing well, that everything was going as planned or as ordered, and that Dr. Tournay, least of all, would be the fallible one among them. Now that the peace had been viscously shattered, Barrow knew that the team might be facing doubts within and among themselves.

"Whatever the case is, I'll repeat to you Dr. Henaro's words which he had explicitly reminded the team of time and again: _Jeopardize Project Lazarus, and I will execute you_." Barrow forced himself from an inevitable tremor. Now that he had revealed to Kurapica what he knew of Project Nexus, he himself had no inkling if he was in the Hunter-Scientist's hitlist. Perhaps, in his quarters, a syringe of deadly toxin was already waiting for him, and he would somehow know that it would be from Dr. Henaro.

Without meaning to, he met Kurapica's eyes. The boy was standing at a corner, arms folded, seemingly calm as a bamboo stalk in summer. After reviewing the information on Nexus, the youth had concisely revealed to him, without further explanation, his next move: _to go to Project Nexus_. Grim determination had enfolded the youth once more. Barrow could not even guess if the boy felt the same anger he had felt when he first knew of Lazarus's cloning program.

Ianto was with them, a small and reachable distance from Kurapica. He offered to attend the meeting with the rest of the team, since he was, after all, under their close surveillance. Some hours had passed since Sianni had been re-assigned to her capsule, and yet Ianto appeared hale and fine. He reported no pain, no weakness. He gave his answers somehow detachedly, and only showed visible emotion when his son spoke to him. Barrow wondered if Ianto already knew of Kurapica's intentions to fly over continents, into the nest of Project Nexus.

"Dr. Barrow?"

Barrow started, instantaneously dropping the stylus which he had tightly held not a moment ago. The man that called his attention was Dr. Rinder, who was usually unsettled and nervous, but now, he looked just as mislaid and even bereaved as his colleagues. "The Project just lost one of its brilliant minds, Francis…"

"Yes, and there will be no replacing him." Barrow knew he was sincere. He retrieved the stylus that had rolled a few inches from his hand. It felt cold, like a lifeless limb. "I know all of you would understand. I was hoping you would. We had lost a great mind, but whatever Zan had done to deserve execution should no longer be brought up. I'm pleading this, for everyone's sake. We'll get our footing back."

"You will lead Project Lazarus in Zan's stead, then?" came a female voice: Dr. Meeks.

"I'm no leader, Cora. But I will do my best." Barrow only imagined the accusatory air he felt in the room. He brushed the hallucinations aside. The team trusted him, and in no way would they think that he was responsible for Tournay's death. However, he could not shake the thought away that he, after all, was partly responsible, for listening to what Tournay had to say. There had been no stopping Tournay back then.

That was when Barrow felt his insides shudder. He was imagining his own guilt, as he was imagining the many eyes of his colleagues poring into him. Yes, he was simply imagining all that… and then the memory of Zan sinking to the floor flashed into his mind.

He wordlessly stood from his chair and without a second glance to the team, to Kurapica and Ianto, he walked out—fled—from the room.

He went through the hallway, his fingers outstretched, feeling for the walls, as though the mere sensation of their smoothness would lead him to his destination—to a small clearing which intersected a number of passageways which led to other halls and offices. The clearing had a tiny lounge and a fountain, similar to the main lounge, but with less of the luxury.

He found his way to the steel railing which separated the room from a glass window that spanned two floors from ground to ceiling. The sun had properly risen and was comfortably taking its place among the dunes outside. The light washed over him and he closed his eyes for a moment. He buried his face with his hands. It would be so easy to simply quit the Project now. It was easy, and yet it was too late.

"Francis."

The scientist immediately looked up, alerted by the sound of the familiar voice. Without turning to its source, he called, "Dr. Henaro?"

The Hunter-Scientist was a few strides behind him. The whole floor was carpeted, so it cradled the sound of his cane. The man leaned on it quietly, his eyes kind.

"Look at me, Francis."

Barrow slowly turned to face the aged, decrepit man. He felt a surprising sense of tranquility shroud him. If Dr. Henaro came here to execute him as well, then he would be ready to face it. If an inadvertent foible on his part would cost the lives of forty-two clones in any manner, then it would be best if he were taken out of the equation. Perhaps it would be more honorable than falling to his knees and wailing, "I quit, I quit!"

Dr. Henaro's clear green eyes met his. Barrow expected to see his kind face, as that was all the memory he had of the Hunter-Scientist; he did not expect, however, for the older man to reach out and offer him something that was _not_ a toxin syringe.

It was a flash drive.

"You'll be needing this," Henaro proclaimed, the fullness of his voice belying how frail-looking he had become, "especially now that you're the new head of Project Lazarus."

Barrow knew he must have looked like a simpleton to the other man with his mouth agape and an expression fit for a beleaguered child rather than a learned professional.

"Ah, take it, Francis," Henaro urged, as though he were simply offering someone a bit of gum. "I'm sure you'll do fine."

Barrow then took the flash drive; it had a shape like a delicate dragonfly. At last, a semblance of sound arose from his throat. "How—"

Henaro drew closer to him, wobbling on his cane. "There are a lot of things that can be questioned, Francis." He nodded. "This isn't one of them." The man's lips formed a small smile, almost invisible under the skin that drooped down his gaunt face.

"Dr. Henaro—" Barrow began. He was between the phrases _How have you been?_ and _Why Zan and not me?_

The Hunter-Scientist, however, seemed to brush his attempts of expressing his concerns away. The older man simply, and with steady confidence, placed a hand on Francis Barrow's shoulder. "It's nice seeing you again, Francis."

With a few, feeble pats on Barrow's shoulder, Henaro took his leave. With much effort, he turned around, leaned on his cane, and like an injured crane, patted away.

"I have to say, Francis," Henaro called out soon after, swerving his head a little so that the younger man could hear his words. "Things turned out better than I expected." He resumed his walk. "I'll be leaving in the evening. I suppose I'll be seeing you again, someday."

Henaro had not quite disappeared from the clearing yet when Barrow heard himself say, "Yes, I'll be seeing you again."

Then there was the sunlight and the silence, save for the sound of trickling of water from the fountain which pieced his sanity together, slowly and surely. Pocketing the flash drive, he made his way back to the conference room; he had never felt his heart beat like a wild animal in a cage like that before.

* * *

Ianto wanted to tell his son, _You'll do no such thing!_ And yet, what had averted his tenacious son from doing anything his heart was set to do in the past? Kurapica sat across him; they were outside Dr. Barrow's office, as the two men and the youth managed to converge once more after the meeting. Barrow had seemed more collected then.

"They have Pairo. They have Ayessi, Kagin, and Kanima. Father, I need to go to them. They'll need me…"

"To do what?" was all Ianto managed to say. He tried to fix his almond-eyed gaze at his son, which Kurapica met, but the look on his son's face was somehow distant and distracted. There was definite fortitude, however, in Kurapica's bearing.

"I honestly don't know yet, father." Kurapica had his hands clasped in front of him, his elbows over his knees. "But I do know that I have to be with them."

"Son," Ianto was saying, his throat dry, "I know what Pairo and the others mean to you, especially Pairo. But this… Project Nexus… I don't like the sound of it."

"I'll have to go, Father. You'll have to allow me to go."

_Five years_, was all Ianto could conjure from his own muddled thoughts. _Five years without Sianni's and my guidance, and now that I am here, I couldn't even guide you well enough._

Ianto found his grip around Kurapica's clinched hands. It was steady, affectionate; Ianto punctuated every word he said with a slight push on his grip. "As soon as I am able, Kurapica, I will follow you to Project Nexus."

"Father—"

"I know you will release yourself from the Nen chains in due time. But I know that you have once again hurt your mother deeply by letting her know that the Nen sword is still in your heart. No, Kurapica, _I will follow you_. Allowing me _that_ is the _least_ you can do."

Kurapica seemed slightly taken off guard with Ianto's words, which were grave and firm. Ianto had finally asserted himself to his obstinate son.

Kurapica could only be at the mercy of his father's gentle yet penetrating gaze. He broke his own gaze away, lowering it so that he could only glimpse at the grip Ianto had on his hands.

He finally gave a nod of assent.

"Kurapica," came Ianto's voice again.

The boy looked up once more at his father.

"Be careful, son." Ianto had slowly leaned forward, closing the gap between them so that their foreheads met. Kurapica felt serenity in him which he had not felt in a very long time.

"I will, father."

"Ianto. Kurapica." This time, it was Dr. Barrow's voice. The pair went on their feet, acknowledging the scientist.

"I-I'm sorry to interrupt, but if Kurapica plans to leave the facility some time soon, we would need to take the needed measures."

Ianto looked questioningly at his son, to which Kurapica returned knowingly. "Father," said Kurapica. "We will be re-programming the Lazarus system so that access to the rest of our clanspeople can only be done through Dr. Barrow and me."

Ianto did not pretend he understood. "Technology, huh? Well, is it something like being a key to a door?"

Kurapica smiled at how quickly his father seemed to pick up on everything. "Yes, something like that."

"Well," began Barrow, "I can only hope that Kurapica can translate this for you in a way which will be easier for you to understand, but… Dr. Henaro has already pre-programmed some parts of the system so that they can only respond to Kurapica's and my DNA impression."

"A thumbprint which extracts a tiny blood sample," relayed Kurapica to Ianto.

"Ah…"

"It's not dangerous, father."

"Well, if you say so, Kurapica. I just…"

"What is it, father?"

Ianto looked like he had seen a flight of swans unfold before him. "It's just that I figured out it would mean that you really have no choice but to be here when your mother awakes. I'm glad."

The youth's eyes held amusement. "You're picking up fast, father."

Ianto held his hands up. "Don't make me understand everything too well, Kurapica. I'll hate myself once I start enjoying it."

"And?"

"Now, son, stop it."

"Are you enjoying it?"

"Kurapica, I'm about to send you a thousand miles away into the unknown, and you're asking me if I'm enjoying it?"

"Well?"

Ianto sighed. "Fine. I'll have to like it once you start teaching me about cell phones. You know how your mother hates those things."

"Cell phones will be easy to learn for you, father. Besides, mother isn't awake to know about it!"

Ianto knew well that Kurapica was fondly jesting with him, and he mentioned his mother with clear warmth in his voice, but Ianto feigned dull fascination. "I think your mother and I spoiled you."

Kurapica grinned. Ianto returned it. The man knew that there was something crucial that awakened in his son now that he knew where his dearest childhood friend was. Kurapica had imparted to him how he had perseveringly searched for their Scarlet Eyes for many long months. Not long ago, he barely had a lead to less than five Scarlet Eyes. A this moment, there was a very strong possibility of bringing the clan back together, whole and alive, and with everyone's eyes back in their heads.

What he was seeing in his son was definitely a beacon of hope.

"Go, get the arrangements done, then," said Ianto, taking his son by the shoulders and leading him to where Dr. Barrow was ready to take him.

* * *

"Did I ever mention to you how complex the Kurata DNA helix is?" Barrow addressed Kurapica as the young man pulled away the sleeve of his right arm so that his hand was now readily exposed. More than a dozen miniscule blood samples will be extracted from him, as he would be programming his DNA impression through his thumbprint into more than a dozen codes in classified parts of the facility.

"And that a simple transfusion of the correct blood type will still not be enough should I get myself heavily injured?" Kurapica replied, finishing the man's thoughts. Dr. Barrow typed in a code to the tiny steel boxes that housed the "reviving serum." Kurapica thrust in his thumb to a number of them; the boxes immediately locked themselves.

"That's correct."

Kurapica waited for the scientist's admonition, which Barrow offered willingly.

"While you're out there, and from now on, you had better not get yourself critically injured, if injured at all. It won't be easy. I don't know what Nexus has up their renegade sleeves."

"Injury," Kurapica stated, punching in his thumb to a few more boxes, "is an old friend I wish not to see for a long time."

Barrow halted his routine for a moment before addressing the boy again. Kurapica sensed a profound disquiet in the man.

"That better be true," Barrow said quietly, still looking disheveled despite one night of dreamless sleep. "Your father will have my head for sure."

"Not when it would take both our _live_ thumbprints to open up more than half of the facility." The boy smiled cockily.

Dr. Barrow marveled how the boy seemed to change, little by little, ever since he had learned more about Project Nexus. It was like dusting off an old and precious piece of jewelry. There had been something buried in the boy for a long time that only need the right opportunity emerge. It had begun to slowly resurface when he found his way back to Ianto and Sianni.

"Well, if you put it that way…"

"Dr. Barrow," called Kurapica; the youth was no longer smiling, but his eyes were peeled off their coldness and amorphous emotions.

"What is it?"

The youth seemed as though he were taking off a huge weight off himself. "Thank you."

This rather caught the scientist off-guard. He could not conceal his apparent wide-eyed stare at the boy. He had thought he was going to have a long day; the day now seemed longer than it was at first, not with all the surprises this young man dashed at him like pebbles to a lake.

"Well—I'm sure I haven't really deserved that, Kurapica," Barrow admitted, still somehow wide-eyed.

"Things would have gone worse, doctor. And I would have taken your life once, if you remember well."

Barrow could still not find the words to counter the boy's.

"You deserve my thanks," Kurapica punctuated, finally. The boy tried to hide any open emotion from his words. The youth simply nodded in passing, to further punctuate what he had said.

Even as Barrow still felt that he was far from applauding his own self, he reminded himself as well that he should take everything in stride. Appreciation from the Kurata boy, after all, was a rare gift. Kurapica had been all but stingy with kind words until now.

"You're welcome, then," returned the scientist. He typed in the code on a final box, punched his own thumbprint in, with which he literally felt a pinprick of pain lick his skin, before handing it to the youth.

Kurapica took the box. "In two months, then," he told Barrow.

Barrow gave the young man a small smile. He had always been for the welfare of the boy; he was a man of little superstition, but it would take little to convince him now that Kurapica, perhaps, in a past life, may have been his own son. Ah, such foolishness. Project Lazarus had, after all, been nicknamed _The Sentiment Experiment_.

"The underground shuttle will take you to the city," Barrow reminded the boy. Without further stringent formalities, he raised his bruised-thumb hand.

"Return safely," said Barrow.

Kurapica smiled, taking Barrow's hand with the thumb-bruised hand of his own, giving it a shake.

"When this is over," said the boy, "you can return us home."

Barrow's smile grew a tad wider, and his eyes shone despite the tiredness. "Phase Two will not commence without you, Kurapica. You do know that."

Kurapica drew his hand away. "I know." After some wordless seconds, the youth resumed, "I will do what I can to know everything about Nexus without jeopardizing Lazarus."

"I have faith in that, Kurapica."

* * *

They returned to Barrow's office when the re-programming was done, and Ianto was waiting for them. The Kurata man stood up, and with surprising calmness, held Barrow's arm and took the man aside.

"My son shouldn't go alone," said Ianto. It appeared that the man had been doing some further pondering while they were away.

"Ianto, he has to, for now. I don't think we can send anyone else, in fear of endangering Project Lazarus."

Ianto's face was grim. "Kurapica has made his choice, so I will make mine. And if you can, make this choice with us."

Barrow wordlessly clasped the man's arm in reassurance.

"Whether or not I am cleared medically for any signs of cell degeneration in a month, I will follow Kurapica to Project Nexus," relayed Ianto.

Barrow considered Ianto's words carefully. "You're also giving me a month to find a way to sustain the vitals of your body while following your son to Nexus."

"I don't desire to return to the capsule. Not when my son is out there."

"Ianto," Barrow tried his best to muster the steadiest eye contact he could with the Kurata man; he knew a father's will to guard and protect, even if he had not had any children himself. He also knew that it was a raw force within Ianto. "One month. You will have what you need."

They heard Kurapica's voice from within the office, calling his father in for his first lesson on the cell phone.

Ianto acknowledged the scientist's own resolve. "Thank you." Then the Kurata left his side to join Kurapica.

It was only then did Dr. Barrow understood why Dr. Henaro had left Project Lazarus to him, what with two men of a proud race thanking him in one day.

"Zan," Barrow said silently. "Don't haunt Lazarus just yet. I think I got this."

He smiled once more, in spite of himself.

* * *

**A/N: **Well, this was a rather eventful chapter! All babbling and less action. Hehe. That's why I slated the action to go to Part 2. I hope that would work, though!

I'd like to once more thank all my readers who had followed, favorited, and reviewed my story so far, but before all that sap and deep gratitude, I still have to finalize _Living Things_ with an epilogue. That's coming up in a bit! ^^

Also, the thumbprint-blood-extraction idea came from the sci-fi film _Gattaca_, whereupon the characters have to be identified through consistent DNA testing in all aspects of their lives.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again: I can't thank you all enough for the reviews and remarks which you've sent, and will be continue. It makes my day when the reviews arrive, and when there are also new reviewers popping up! ^^ I know I can rely on you to continue to follow Kurapica's adventures (sounds cheesy) at the sequel. :D You guys are awesome.

Cheers!

DW-chan :3


	13. Epilogue: Nothing To Lose

***HxH Disclaimer***

**Author's Notes:** Happy Epilogue Day! xD Here ends my fanfic _Living Things_. ^^

I know it may sound like some cliché speech, but it's been a great ride writing this; I had fun with this piece, and especially reading your reviews and remarks. :D I would never have finished this (a little behind schedule :P) without you guys. YOU ARE THE BESTEST. :DD

I always give special and fond mention to my faithful and new reviewers: Raywolf Shibelt, Kiniro-chan, Florrallover, a guest reader, LordOfTheWest, Ongaku no Usagi, kunoichi79, and Paperoo! *more party hats and cookies*

Okay, let's do this so we can move to Part 2 soonest. xD

* * *

Living Things  
By: DW-chan

_**Epilogue: Nothing To Lose**_

22 messages.

11 missed calls.

Kurapica realized that he had completely neglected his own cell phone in his stay at the facility, not when he had to give quite a thorough lesson to his father about the said device. He gave a little grin when he realized that five of the messages and seven of the calls were his own father's, who had simply been testing his hand at the cell phone when Kurapica had told him "to review."

The rest were either Leorio's or Senritsu's. He wondered were Gon and Killua had disappeared to, but wherever they were, there had always been one way or another for them to meet again.

_I'm all right_, he replied to a couple of messages. That's all he needed to say.

He would be leaving for the city in an hour. Kurapica wanted a quiet, uneventful exit; Dr. Barrow would, once more, know what to say when more questions arose from the rest of the Lazarus team. There would always, however, be the need to be more vigilant—at least to remain well and intact until two months had passed, when Sianni would revive once more, and maybe, just maybe, with everyone else…

The lure of home in Rukso was strong, but he then remembered some lines of an old poem he had read some time before:

_Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,  
__I took the one less traveled by,  
__And that has made all the difference._

"The road not taken," Kurapica whispered. He tucked the phone back into the pocket of his tunic. He slid his hand out, and clenched them, almost in reflex. He imagined his Nen chains, the weight of them, the scent of them, the rough silver color of them. Yet he did not materialize them. It was a start.

His phone gave a tiny, vibrating beep. Only slightly puzzled, he pulled it out of his pockets once more, and opened the new message.

_Gdlck KpiC a,,,,,_

It was from his father again.

"I think I've finally gotten the hang of it!" came a quite triumphant voice from behind him. Kurapica turned and Ianto was walking to him, a small gleam of a smile on his face. His father looked like he had discovered a moon within the moon and was proclaiming his accomplishment to the world.

Kurapica blinked.

"It's got a QWERTY keypad," the boy simply said.

Ianto looked at Kurapica as though he were seeing the boy for the first time. "What's that, son?" He still looked rather exultant.

"It'd be nice, father, if you spelled the words in full and correctly—"

"Right, right," Ianto nodded, his brows furrowing. He seemed in good spirits, despite the fact that his son will be gone again from his side. He had not taken his eyes off the cell phone. "Give me another day, maybe. My fingers keep on slipping."

"Just don't keep sending me practice messages every hour, father."

"Oh, did I just do that?"

Kurapica felt like scratching a sudden itch at the back of his head. There were simply times when his parents would think and act alike. He knew Sianni would be no different with her fascination with technology, even if she found it terribly outlandish in the first place. He even had a sneaking suspicion that Sianni wanted a cell phone for herself, and was only pretending she didn't, to occasionally appease her husband's old-fashioned sense.

Kurapica shook his head as he watched his father tinker with the cell phone some more. And once again Kurapica felt his phone buzz.

"Father!"

"Last one, last one!"

Kurapica glanced at his phone.

_Say hi to PaIRO fr M m,e_

Kurapica blinked again. He decided to humor his father. He replied to his father's message then and there, when they were only a few feet apart…

_I will, father._

"Wait, I got this," said Ianto, trying to open his new message. He grinned once more when he had done so without much effort. The man looked up from his fumbling, his smile not fading. "You're quite a good teacher, Kurapica!"

Kurapica continued to humor his father. "Um, thanks."

They stood under the high noon sun; Kurapica had found his way outside the facility again, in the same courtyard-like expanse with their arching gateways and delicate architecture, neither flamboyant nor nondescript. He had walked on the very same grounds when he first ventured to enter the facility. Somehow, right at this moment, it did not seem too overbearing, and the air seemed a little fresher.

Dr. Barrow came to fetch him half an hour later to accompany him to the underground shuttle. "Zan's family finally responded," he informed Kurapica; the boy found himself genuinely interested in the posthumous affairs of the late head scientist. He had never really liked Dr. Zan Tournay, but after he had ascertained that Tournay might have had risked his life for the knowledge of Nexus, which he possessed now, filled Kurapica with unbidden gratitude.

"How is Dr. Tournay's family?"

Barrow seemed rather surprised that the boy was concerned. "It was a sister that answered my call. I can't, however, reach his nephew. It's quite a pity, though, since the nephew had been Tournay's primary concern… once. Well, that can't be helped now. I'll get to him soon enough."

"What reason did you give them?"

Barrow once more felt the odd amazement towards Kurapica's curiosity.

"A work hazard," he returned. "Only the half-truth, I'm afraid. Though I doubt," said the man slowly, "that the family would bother to know the truth, either way. Tournay was…" he cleared his throat. "He was a man married to his work. He had custody over his nephew, and yet he chose to remain with Project Lazarus…"

"Just as you have."

Barrow turned to the youth, still mildly beguiled at Kurapica's precociousness and his habit of treating every adult as an equal, rather than an elder—unless, perhaps, it came to Ianto and Sianni. _Even then_, thought Barrow with a smile, _not so much_.

"I've seen Lazarus this far, Kurapica," Barrow said. "And in all honesty, though I still have some of my misgivings, I just couldn't deny the fact that we may be working on a miracle here. A good one, and I have high hopes."

"Then I wish you all the luck, doctor," Kurapica said, with an awkward formality. "My people are in your hands. They are my world."

"I had known nothing but Project Lazarus nearly all the days I've been a scientist; I've been here even before the Project had a name. You can say," Barrow chose his words willfully, "That this is my world, too."

The trek to the underground passageway that led to the facilities' lesser-known shuttle station seemed shorter than expected. Ianto had walked abreast with the young man and the scientist, silently observing their conversation, knowing that under Barrow's leadership, there will no longer be secrets kept from father and son. Transparency, confidentiality… there was a subtle balance between the two. Barrow would find his way.

Kurapica only needed to bring a few necessities. He practically came to the facility barehanded, with hardly anything in his knapsack. His father, however, had practically ordered him to supply himself with enough food that would last him a dozen trips around the world.

"It's what your mother would've wanted," proclaimed the man.

Barrow, on the other hand, supplied him with a mini-tablet.

"The information in there won't endanger us," Barrow assured the Kurata boy. "But it's best if you knew a bit more about the essence of what Nexus is trying to achieve. It's old information. Nothing to worry about."

"Light reading for the trip," Kurapica declared matter-of-factly.

"It would seem like that, I hope," answered Barrow.

Once more, the doctor and the youth shook hands. The boy's grip was sturdier, more certain.

"Now, now," said Ianto when his turn came. "I'll be tailing you, anyway, Kurapica, so let's make this quick."

_Quick_ was Ianto placing both his hands on Kurapica's shoulders.

It was Ianto admiring his son's fearlessness.

It was them knowing the fear in both their hearts.

It was the anticipation of a portent, and whether it was a good or ill one, none of them could say yet.

Ianto pulled his son into a bear-hug, a hand resting on the boy's golden head. Kurapica did not resist, and he held on for a moment.

"May the gods be with you," Ianto said, voice low.

Kurapica found himself saying, "They always have."

Then father and son parted; Dr. Barrow himself opened the shuttle door for the boy. Kurapica nodded his thanks. That was the last he saw of the scientist and his father, at least in the days to come, as the shuttle sped away, driverless, magnetized to its railing and trailing into the darkness, with a few lights dotting the tunnel every now and then.

* * *

There is a certain peace, and yet a certain dysphoria, and still yet a certain elation of knowing that one is living for something bigger than himself.

Kurapica had conversed with that purpose nearly everyday of his life, as though it were a living being apart from him. The purpose would simply look back with eyes deeper than dark agates. In his once-fevered desire for revenge, the purpose would stand taller than him, almost in mockery, and with an iron grip.

The purpose was all-or-nothing. It had been menacing. In his darkest days, and even with the faint visions of his friend's faces looming overhead, he knew that the purpose would never leave his side, whether it came in the form of an angry fire, a shadow, or a ray of light.

This time, purpose took on a new face. It was Ianto's face, Sianni's face, Pairo's face. It was the rolling hills of Rukso, and the swelling, shimmering rivers that surrounded it.

It even took the face of Project Lazarus and the lives involved in it. It took the face of Project Nexus and the lives involved in it as well, in faces known and unknown, named and nameless.

He had once kept saying to Dr. Barrow: _I had nothing to lose._

_And perhaps_, Barrow had replied, _everything to gain_.

Kurapica conversed with purpose once more. It was an inner conversation: nothing more, nothing less.

Outside the airship window, Kurapica glimpsed at the sky and at the glittering sea below, all vastness, wide and ever-stretching for miles and miles and miles.

The sun had begun to set.

* * *

**A/N: **The end.

Kthxbye!

Just kidding! ^^

Well, there we go! I hope I haven't left any threads hanging lose, but in case there are, well, the sequel is always an excuse. x3 Wow, so much for a graceful exit. xD

The lines of the poem I included in this chapter are from Robert Frost's _The Road Not Taken._ ^^

Here ends Part 1 of Kurapica's adventures in a pseudo-scifi setting. :P

I'll see you all at the sequel. ^^

Until then, GRATITUDE, MUCH LOVE, AND CHOCOLATE CAKE.

Cheers,

DW-chan :3


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